


Pink is minus green

by Congar



Category: Deltarune (Video Game), Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:28:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25631305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Congar/pseuds/Congar
Summary: What is life if not diving inside as many backpacks as you can to sample the goods inside? Sometimes you find hard books, and sometimes you find sweaty clothes that have been in there for a bit longer than is acceptable, but sometimes you find one filled with cake toppings and sweets.And what is that diving life if you don't take some time off and enjoy a nice, calming siesta to let all those sweets and cake toppings process?Yup, life sure is good for a little dark soot sprite clad in green robes and a pointy hat.Hopefully there won't be any drastic changes that would involve any inverting of color that would happen upon the little soot sprite?Oh wait, the art below.Well dang.
Kudos: 9





	Pink is minus green

**Author's Note:**

> This is a story based on [The Soot Sprite Ralsei Askblog,](https://the-soot-nest.tumblr.com/) created by [Smieska.](https://smieska-draws.tumblr.com/)

  


“The hell?”

With a brow hanging low, Susie peers over to the closed door to the janitor closet before shaking her head with a slight scoff.

“First time I’ve heard that door squeak.”

She is both correct and wrong in her shrugged statement to Kris next to her. Yes, it was the first time she heard the janitor closet door squeak. That she was correct in. However, she was wrong in that it was the door that squeaked. Whether or not that made her completely wrong was an unsaid question that neither Kris or Susie acknowledged.

Someone that acknowledges it even less is Kris’ passenger which they’ve no idea about cursing and thrashing in the top pocket of their backpack. The angry cursing blends together with the rustling of the strewn-about papers littering the closet floor, making the two Lightners none the wiser about the sooty swearing cursing that he was awoken so abruptly.

Here the little soot was enjoying a nice and relaxing siesta after having snuck into Kris’ backpack and eaten the unopened packages of sweets and chocolate buttons. A soot needs to sleep after a meal that delicious, dammit! Can’t do that with the patch-worked getting knocked off due to someone not being able to close a door quietly!

Like a perturbed maracas down a steep flight of stairs, the little soot grumbled as it stretched itself to fetch their hat laid deflated just...out...of...reach.

“I wonder if Seam will let me swing Jevil by his tail for being such a nuisance this time around.”

The soot could easily just stand up from the crinkled wrapper of cookie crumbles had it gotten enough sleep, but after having been rudely awoken, how could it?

Just...have...to...reach...a...bit...further...for...the...green…

Pink.

Pink hat.

“Aaah, the air here in the field is always so fresh! Had me pumped up to be all evil and things! Hahahaha!”

Why is the patchwork hat pink? And why is the pink scarf green? It’s supposed to be pink, but it isn’t! 

The soot scratches its white head and-

What!

White!

“Yeah, I agree with your roaring stomach, Kris. Speaks my language, apart from someone else I know. Let’s hurry. I’m hungry too.”

The many empty wrappers around the soot had changed too! The chocolate looks like cream vanilla, the cookies looks like...other cookies, and the sprinkles is an inverted rainbow! 

But the hat! The hat is pink! And the soot sprite is white! Ashy white! Snow white, even! It’s horrible! What happened?

With cramping stemming from excursion too early after enough eating but not enough rest, the little panicked soot jumps up to open up the top pocket even more. Light! He needs light! It takes a few tries, but eventually he manages to bring in enough light so that he can drag over a small bottle of water that he had drunk half of. With impatient taps of his foot, the soot waits for the water to settle down. With how Kris is walking though, and with how Susie is jokingly nudging at him, the impatient tapping quickly spreads to the other foot. The pink tip of the sprite’s hat falls over as it matches the angry brow sinking with more and more anger, until finally the water settles down for long enough that a clear reflection can be seen.

Even after blinking hard and rubbing his eyes, the slightly-refracted reflection of a white soot wearing a pink robe and hat doesn’t change. Doesn’t change when the soot tugs at the pink to try and rip it off, nor does it change when he blows at the tip of his hat like a horn to try and clear the pink color off that way!

Oh no…

With small, white hands turning the rim of the minus-green hat, the soot sheds a single, sugar-filled tear. 

Only one though!

And as it splashes against the crumbled-filled bottom of the backpack’s top pocket, the little sprite shoves his hat back on until the rim stops just above his tilted eyes burning with determination. He didn’t spend two minutes rummaging through that Ms. Toriel’s leftover fabric scraps then another for the thread for nothing! The green suits him! It suits his black bristles and the flush cheeks when he smiles! Pink...pink doesn’t work with black! It doesn’t work with white either! It’s too bright! Not enough contrast! The angry blush on his bristling cheeks blend together with his clothing instead of complementing them!

How could he ever let someone see him like this?

No, no he has to figure this out. He has to get back to the way he was. He can’t be having this!

But how?

“Ey, Kris, let me see how far I can throw your backpack.”

Wha-

“Just give it here, nerd!”

No, no the soot isn’t gonna lose his hat again! It might be pink, but it still has a chance to become green again!

“See, now you don’t have to carry it so long!”

Amid the fluttering wrappers and half-drunk water bottle, the soot finds himself upside down looking over a strange landscape as strangely colored as he is. Orange, blue, black, red, green, and as strangely shaped as it is colored. His mind doesn’t have long to get used to the strange though, as he’s forced to use his hat as a parachute lest he falls down into a seemingly bottomless pit about to be filled with wrappers and a lonely water bottle. 

While he was out of danger in terms of falling into a bottomless pit, the soot didn’t have any real control to the irregular winds throwing him to the side and up with each gust. Eventually his fruitless failings has him landing in an orange crown belonging to a skewed tree. Clumsily he catches his balance on a twig, only to rapidly skip over to its end to survey around him. He sees a road, and he hears muffled laughing, but from where exactly he can’t tell. He needs to get higher up, but the wind is stronger up there. It’ll only throw him through another harrowing journey of uncontrolled flying. 

With white arms crossed and pink hat giving shadow to his eyes narrowed in thought, the soot sits down.

Can he…

No, no he can’t. He doesn’t have the proper permits or tools with him to chop down this strange forest and build a small village for himself. Maybe if he tried thinking the other way instead? What’s the simplest thing he can do to improve his bright situation?

Climb down from the tree would be a start, but then where would he go?

The soot makes two rounded shapes with his hands to use as binoculars. In the distance he sees something that could be commotion caused by civilization, so guess he’s heading that way then. 

Just gotta wait for someone to pass by on the road below. Using the winds he’s ruled out as transportation.

After ten or so minutes, an Eight of Clubs swaggers by with a jolly whistle. Will not be the most comfortable ride the soot sprite has had, but it would have to do. The walking card was heading in the right direction, and that was where the soot wanted to go. Behind one of the large leaves he hides until the shadow of the walking card is beginning to thicken below him, and then he jumps!

“What is it with these freaking tiny hats?” complains Susie with a heaving sigh and a befuddled shake of her head. With a click of her tongue she scoffs at the Eight of Clubs walking past her with a tiny, pink hat balancing with effort upon its top side. “So dumb.” She returns to loitering as hooligany as she can against the wall of Seam’s store. “And even dumber that you managed to forget all the cake toppings, Kris! Your mom has an entire cupboard full of those! You couldn’t pick like two or something? Jeez.”

A sooty streak is drawn on the Eight of Clubs’ backside from the soot sprite sliding down the curvature of the card with one hand holding hard on his hat and another tugging down his pink robe even harder. He timed his slide down the card with its swaggering steps so that once he reaches the end, he is flung up, sailing through the air with his hat slowing and controlling his fall. With an acrobatic tumble, something easier to do on something solid rather than a flimsy branch, the soot carries his momentum across the till sill until he manages to dive underneath the metal bell undetected. He can catch his breath there, at least until another customer arrives.

“Kris!” that annoying Lightner shouts again. “Just get the cake mix and lets go already!” She sounds annoyed herself, which serves her right. Grumbling and scratching her foot against the loose gravel, she huffs and puffs to sound more like a delinquent.

“You wouldn’t mind not doing that?” is asked from the shop keep whom the soot can see from underneath the upper shell of the metal bell he’s hiding underneath. The one button for an eye has its four thread-holes flattening out to match the unamused squint of the other, more normal eye. “Or at least buy something if you’re gonna hang around, please. I have a new, cool ax with spikes on it if you want.”

The soot can see that ax behind the large, stuffed shop keep leaning onto the wall.

“That one is just foam and rubber, Seam. I don’t do foam and rubber. Too weak for the things I want to cut up!”

Maybe with the two busy with conversation the soot can make a quick escape now that he’s gotten his breath back? He just gotta be careful so that he doesn’t-

“Actually, let’s see if Kris hears this.”

As soon as the soot pokes out a foot, the metal bell is absorbed within large, pink fingers. The bell is lifted up, with the soot within in. 

“Kris!” the Lightner shouts again. When no answer arrives, the metal bell is pushed down hard, with the soot barely managing to get him and his hat out of the way from the inner mechanisms. The ringing is loud, but not as loud as a normal bell is. “What?” The confusion in the voice, and more importantly the shell of the metal bell being pushed down and twisted, has the sprite’s mind speeding through his options. He could pop out and try and run for it, but with two outside it is a very risky option. He can’t hide, because…

Because…

Wait…

Pained and hoarse ringings emerge from the mechanisms of the de-lidded metal bell as Susie shakes them up to her ear. “Sounds fine...” She tries to peer inside the little nooks and crannies, but finds nothing that could explain the noise the bell made. “Strange,” she comments to herself.

Her perplexed mumbling gives the sprite his chance! He drops from the inner roof of the shell Susie holds in her other hand. Her focus is completely on the mechanisms that she doesn’t notice at all. Before she can screw the shell on again and ring the bell to have it sound just like any other bell should, the soot has already scurried into a small hole in the shop’s wall behind its shop keep. Just like back home in the rafters in Kris’ home, the soot hurries up the small gaps between the wooden planks until he reaches the beams in the roof. There he can hide and survey below him, completely hidd-

“Is that some of my cotton up there?”

With a sooty squeak reminiscent of an accidental stroke of a brush, the soot retreats to a darker corner.

“Pink too? Pink cotton?” the shop keep wonders aloud while pulling out his button eye to look closer. “Cotton candy?”

How? The soot retreated to a dark corner and-

Oh…

Oh no!

“Guess I’ll have to clean a bit sooner than expected.” The shop keep pats his eye back before shrugging a sigh. He reaches for a stool all the while the soot sprite beads with sweat reflecting his bright bristles. Just below him are shelves filled with an assortment random enough that he will fit in despite him being a pine cone in the fruit salad up among the beams. Down in the shelves he’ll be a pine cone among pine cones!

There even were some on the shelves being sold at a ridiculously expensive price!

The soot couldn’t just jump down though, for if he did the shop keep would assume that whatever it was that he needed to clean up had fallen down. The sprite had to be smart about it if he was to not be caught. With a quick survey of the many toys and not-toys on the shelves, the soot didn’t see anything that could be immediately similar to him or his color. Even more reason to curse how he looked at the moment, if anything.

What he did find though was a slumped-over doll with loose stitching on its back. If the soot was lucky, the doll could be stuffed with cotton, which would be perfect. Before that he needed to time it perfectly. Carefully, the sprite peered over the edge of the beam at the shop keep struggling with a step ladder.

“You need a Lightner to open that up for you, Darkner?” quipped Susie with a rude snicker from the other side of the shop’s window, which prompted a cold stare from the shop keep’s button eye. In that moment the soot jumps down from the beam, but a small streak of bright for the brief time he’s in the air before he lands on the highest shelf. An obstacle course of nicks he jumps over, with the knacks having him dodge underneath. 

Once finally at the slumped-over doll, the soot widens the loose stitching at its back. Yes! Perfect! There’s cotton! Despite his internal jubilation at having found what he needed, he could not cheer just yet. For one, it would alert where he was, and for second, he still needed to get the cotton back up to the beams.

“Maybe if you loosened it on the other side?”

Maybe if you didn’t do anything so the sprite would have time!

“Ah, there you go.”

No! 

With a violent and desperate tug, the soot manages to get a hold of a chunk of cotton out the back of the widened stitching. He pulls, and he pulls, and he pulls! 

But he pulls too much.

A cloud of cotton flied out the back of the doll which instantly collapses into a flat pile of inanimate fabric. The soot looks down at the gentle smile flattened and scrunched on the unsupported dark muzzle, and an unpleasant shiver shoots through him at the uncanny, deflated smile staring without life back up at him.

The soot’s shiver is stopped by the enormous ball of cotton between his hands though, too big a piece than he planned to take. No time to try and put it back into the doll though, as the sound of a step ladder locking itself stiff sends another shiver through him. With the cotton ball in his hands the same size as him, the soot knocks over a few of the smaller pieces on the shelf, but none big enough for the others to notice. He flies up the wall again, and quickly beings to tear into the cotton ball, dispersing it as widely as he can. It ends up like a heavy snowfall on top of the beam, but it would have to do.

Because he had to hide again!

“What was that?”

Dammit!

“What was what?”

They glanced him diving back down onto the shelf.

“That on the shelf. I think some cotton fell behind it.”

No! No you didn’t!

“You did? I didn’t see anything.”

Exactly! Nothing! You didn’t see anything! You didn’t see nothing either! You didn’t everything!

A large shadow cast darkness over the shelves, which the soot stood out in. The cat-like shop keep didn’t look down though as he was busy being surprised at the amount of cotton on top of the beam. “My word...” He stretched himself, giving the soot a window of light to sneak through to the other side of the shelf. “These look like type I used in the doll.” The shop keep’s shadow shifted again, and this time it was for him to look at the shelf. “Strange...”

Oh no, he saw the doll being just a pile of fabric! If he put together that the cotton on the beam was the same as inside the doll who knew how suspicious he would be? The soot had to do something.

Again.

“That’s...a lot of cotton you have there, Seam.”

First in with one arm.

“I know, and they look like the cotton I use for my dolls.”

Then one leg.

“Your dolls?”

Then the hat.

“I do them on the side.”

Then the other arm.

“Of what?”

Then the last leg!

“Of...”

The soot had to simultaneously breathe in and stretch himself out to fill the inside of the doll the same as it was when it was filled with cotton before the large, fluffy hand gripped around him. With all his might, the soot managed to hold in his reactionary squeak.

“Of pleasant customers, usually,” said the shop keep, muffled through the fabric, as he placed the doll back on the shelf. “A loyalty bonus, if you will.” His voice sounded more distant with his latter sentence, which the soot took to be him turning away. The soot breathed out, but not enough that it would change the shape of the doll too much. “This latest one there behind me is for that prince fellow. The dark one with a green pointy hat and a green robe to go along.”

A dark one with a green pointy hat and a green robe to go along? 

That sounded...familiar.

“Ralsei?” 

No idea who that is.

“Yes, that’s him.”

Oh…

Well if anything he has a good taste in fashion. None of that the doll wore though. It was as naked as could be, and a shame to since otherwise the soot could’ve used those to fashion some green garbs for himself. 

“You don’t say, Seam?” The surprised climb in tone was followed by a short session of finger drumming.

“Yes...I do,” the shop keep’s voice hesitantly answered, “and don’t expect one to be made in your image anytime soon, Lightner.”

The finger drumming stopped just as the soot was about to try and take a step behind and have the doll fall over naturally. “Why not?” He ends up having to balance on one foot with his hat gliding down into his eyes. “I’ve been shopping plenty of stuff here! Dozens of axes!”

“Attitude, young Lightner. You have a bit too much of it for your own good.”

“Pah!”

“Like that.”

The rim of the hat doesn’t come off no matter how much the soot shakes his head. Back and forth, up and down, but to no avail! With those attempts fruitless, he throws his head forwards.

“Um...”

Too much! Too much!

“Your doll, Seam.”

The soot tries to lean back, but he fails to fight against the weight of the doll pulling itself and its sooty stuffing over the edge of the shelf. Tumbling down, the sprite clutches himself close to prepare for the rough landing that...doesn’t happen. The soot doesn’t land hard against the floor, but instead lands in a soft embrace.

“Seems to be flying off the shelves there, Seam!” The muffled self congratulation is followed up by a loud, flat slam followed by another self-congratulatory cheer. “Yes! So good!”

A long, caring thumb strokes over the chest of the doll, and subsequently the soot within it. It feels...nice, but the soot isn’t gonna acknowledge that. Neither the scratch on the back, or the brushing of either side, or just the general warmth of being held with gentle care.

Or...something.

“With you and the other Lightner here my guess is that you’re to meet Ralsei, right?”

The flat muzzle is pulled out to its proper length, which the soot doesn’t feel anything on. How rude. 

“That we are. Just waiting for Kris to fix being stupid and forgetting to bring with him the cake decorations. Jeez, can’t believe you can just forget the one thing someone asks you to bring with you, right?”

Then back to caressing the doll’s stomach again. How nice.

“Yes,” was answered quickly just to get it over with. “Now if you’re meeting this prince, could you perhaps bring the doll with you?”

How…

Actually is that good or bad?

The soot doesn’t know yet.

“Shouldn’t you, you know, make some clothes for him first? Otherwise it’s quite weird of you asking me bring a naked doll of my friend to him.”

The soot sprite flattens out for a moment as the doll is swung around. “Ralsei was the one that didn’t ask me to make any clothes for the doll. He didn’t want to be a bother about it. Making the doll was already well enough, if not too enough.”

Damn that Ralsei then! Because of that the soot can’t make green clothes for himself!

“That both sounds like something he would say and something I shouldn’t really ask anymore questions about.”

No, ask more! If you ask more then maybe the shop keep will say where he keeps the green fabric.

“That’s up to you, Lightner.”

No, no it’s not! Just ask!

“I mean, I’ll bring it with me if you want since I’m off to meet with him and all that.”

Alright, it had gone to how bad now. Not how good, that’s been ruled out. The soot had to leave and try and find a way back. Being alone in this strange world would be tough, but the soot was much tougher! Finding a way out would be difficult, but it would be a challenge he would relish. Easy doesn’t do it for him! No! Never!

“Finally, Kris! You got the cake stuff?”

First out with one arm.

“Oh this?”

Then in with one arm.

“Seam made it for Ralsei. Don’t ask why it’s naked. Not that you ask anything to begin with. Put it in your backpack so that I don’t have to carry it.”

How...good?

Yes, yes that was good. If the doll was in the backpack he would have and easier time to get out of it and to plan his escape. He escaped it once already, so a second time wouldn’t-

“You don’t have to throw it, Lightner.”

“Just making sure it’s tender for when Ralsei gets it. Can’t have the doll be harder than him.”

Ow…

“But what if you broke it?”

Ow ow ow ow.

“You don’t trust your own sewing, Seam?”

The soot feels ill from the sudden acceleration, more so from the sudden deceleration too. His robe lays flipped over his head, and his hat managed to lodge itself inside the muzzle of the doll.

“It will make you good to be gentle once in a while, Lightner.”

“I’m gentle enough for what I do, Darkner! I- oops...”

And that was the sound of the backpack’s zipper lock breaking.

Fantastic.

“Eh, I have Ralsei to be gentle in my stead. He’s too gentle for his own good anyways so in a way I am helping him by acting like myself.”

After the pain calms down a bit, the soot manages to crawl out of the hollow doll which he shuffles into a corner of the backpack. Through the slim light bouncing through the tiny gap between the zipper lock and the edge of the zipper, the soot navigates through the bags of flour and other confectioneries to try and wrestle open an escape. From what dim light that reflects off of him he spots that the lock has burrowed into the fabric of the backpack, which the soot isn’t strong enough to remove. He sighs, and shoves his hands into his robe pockets angrily.

He’s locked inside the backpack.

How bad.

He can’t escape.

How bad.

Just a bunch of bags around him.

How...bad?

Bags with cake stuff.

How good.

Cake stuff enough to prompt another siesta.

How excellent!

Eagerly, the soot sprite rubs his hands together while perusing his options.

Wait…

Options?

There are no options!

There are no options when could have it all!

It doesn’t take long before his bristles becomes covered in pieces and dusts of confectioneries, and with a pleased, tired expression underneath the layers of sugar and sweets, the sprite falls asleep with snores that puffs increasingly-thinner clouds of powdered sugar. The pink rim of his hat falls over his eyes.

And he drifts off into siesta.

A siesta filled with dreams of green and black. Where nothing is pink and nothing is white. Where everything is normal. 

“U...um, Susie? Could you perhaps help me a bit here, please?”

It was a different voice that lulled the soot’s siesta to a close. It wasn’t loud enough to completely wake him though, so whoever it was would be spared the soot’s wrath for their heinous crime. 

“With what, the backpack?”

Oh for…

“Yes, the zipper seems to be stuck.”

Yeah, it is, so let it be. It can’t be opened. The soot tried, and he’s the best at it. So just scurry along and do something else and let the soot sprite return to his siesta.

Please and thank you.

And also get lost!

“Does look that way.”

See? All you have to do now is to get lost. It’s as easy as can be!

“S-Susie?”

Yes, follow along those fading footsteps.

“S-Susie, why are you picking that up? What are you going to do with it?”

Why are the footsteps getting louder again? Hm...maybe the door is on the other side of the room?

“No no no no no no no no!”

But if that’s the case, why did the footsteps just stop all of a sudd-

“There we go! Opened up all for you, Ralsei.”

The sharp edge of the knife thrust through the closed zipper and into the backpack like lightning piercing the a cloud-covered sky and splitting it in two missed the soot’s head by less than a bristle’s length. Less can be said for his pink hat though, which falls down onto his shoulders akin to a dropped, open newspaper. The soot’s head sticks out like a peeled banana, with eyes bulging with each quick, startled breath.

“B-but Kris’ backpack...”

“Eh, there’s like three more from when Kris’ brother was Kris’ age so it should be easy enough just to replace this one. Besides, this one was already on its very last legs so I’m just doing Kris a favor.”

“Y-yes...b-but-”

“I’ll let you get to baking now, Ralsei. I’m gonna head out to where there’s that sign that forbids loitering and loiter for a while. I’ll come back when I smell that the cake is coming along, alright?”

“O...okay, Susie. H-Have fun loitering.”

“Always have! Always will! Hahahahaha!”

A door is shut, muffling the overly-eager laughter until it becomes completely quiet.

“Have fun...breaking the law.”

A tired sigh prefaces an anxious hum.

“Should do the cake quickly so that she isn’t caught loitering.”

The soot, frozen in fear from having almost being stabbed, can only watch with increasing horror as a shadow closes in towards the knife-made opening of the backpack. He knows that he needs to hide, but he can’t move! He could take shelter within the doll and hide. It would be more ideal since he was a bit bloated from his eating. He would fill it out even more!

Yes, yes it is the best plan!

So move it!

Quickly!

Hurry!

Before the soot is-

“Aaaaah!”

...Spotted.

“Your hat, little creature.”

Spotted?

“Oh no, it’s split cleanly in two.”

A dark, furry hand reaches in for the white soot, who scrambles back away from it as best he can. It has the dark hand flinching, and curling up timidly. “F-Forgive me if I scared you, little one, but I’m only trying to help.” It moves up to the handle of the knife. “I’ll get this out first and foremost.” It takes a few weak couple of tugs before it comes loose, and with another hand as protection so that the blade doesn’t cut the soot on the way out of the backpack, the knife is lifted out. “Better?”

The soot...nods.

Something about the gentle voice of whoever it is outside the backpack has him trusting whoever. The furry hand returns into the backpack, opened and tender in the slight, inviting bend of the soft fingers. “Let me help you get out of here.” The soot jumps into the palm without any thought of the danger it might bring. 

“There we go. Just come out of there and- Oh?”

The soot forgot his hat.

“Ah, right.”

His cut, split hat…

“I can help you fix it if you want?” the gentle voice offers with a titter at the end. “After all, it was my friend that did this to you, so I should be the one to fix it.”

No, it should be the friend who should fix it.

Although considering how crass and delinquent she has been acting the soot very much doubts her ability to hold a nail and thread. Nothing at all he trust her with, actually.

The one offering his hand for him though he trusts, and he jumps back into the awaiting palm with the split hat hanging from one hand. The bright light outside the backpack has the soot squinting, only being able to see the dark outline of the one holding him in his hand. Dark and...green? The soot’s eyes shoots wide open in surprise!

But that only blinds him further!

“Oh no, little one,” the gentle voice worries for a second before putting his other hand as shade for the soot. “I should have thought of that. I’m sorry.”

The shade from the hovering hand allows the soot to gasp to who it is holding him.

It’s the doll!

But with green clothes! A green robe and a green, pointy hat!

Fantastic!

That means the soot can make green clothes for himself!

And that the gentle voice is naked underneath his green robe and pointy hat!

…

Wait, where did that come from?

“My name is Ralsei,” the darkly-furred Darkner introduces with a small tilt to his head which has his ears gliding off his shoulders. “Judging by your looks and the fact that you’re inside Kris’ backpack I’m guessing that you’re a Lightner?”

A what? Lightner? The soot had no idea what that meant. He did hear the shop keep and Susie say that before, along with Darkner, but he didn’t know anything about that.

Seeing the little soot in his hand angling his head confusingly with one white eyebrow lifted into his pink hat, Ralsei began explaining. “Darkners are the ones that live in this world, while Lightners come from another. You came with Kris and Susie, right?”

A light snowfall of sugar landed as a faint cover on Ralsei’s hand as the soot nodded to the question.

“Then you’re a Lightner, little creature.” Ralsei’s smile pushed his eyes close, and had his hand balling into an excited fist.

His free hand, that is.

“How wonderful to meet you. I am Prince Ralsei, what’s your name?”

The soot’s brow sank in thought, looking down to put his hand to his bristle-covered chin. As he did though, more of the powdered sugar covering him was shaken loose, making the small patch on Ralsei’s hand more opaque. Then even more when the soot’s eyes shot open.

“It tickles,” Ralsei said through a nasal laugh as the soot begins to write his name in the layer of sugar. He only manages half of his name before the tickling becomes too much for Ralsei, who’s giggling huff blows the powdered sugar away from both his hand and the soot’s bristles. In the brief moment of seeing the white cloud in front of him, the soot looks down at himself with hope swelling within him, but which is quickly drained like a bucket without a bottom when he sees that he’s still white.

Oh well, it was worth a try.

“Oh no...” comes an apologetic whimper from the Darkner. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to, little one.” The pointy of his hat struggles to keep up as he turns and looks around for something to fix the situation with. “Do...do you think you can write in flour too? Is that possible?”

The sprite doesn’t see why not, so he answers with a loose shrug and motions for Ralsei to carry him over, which he does with another apology for the inconvenience. He puts the soot down onto a wooden work surface strewn with ingredients, bowls, and spoons of different sizes. The soot picks up a metal one, and grimaces at his reflection with an annoyed pout that distorts in the convex surface of the back of the spoon. 

“Multi-grain or normal flour best for you to write in?”

Um...

While the soot appreciates the thought and concern from Ralsei giving the choice he frankly has no idea which of the two types would be best to write in. Nevertheless, the dark Darkner holds up the two bags for the soot to pick from. Another haphazard shrug reverberated through his bristles, and without any basis or reasoning, he chooses the multi-grain flour with an unconvinced point. 

“You sure?” Ralsei asks seeing the lack of assurance in the soot’s choice.

No, no he’s not sure. He has no clue at all! Just go with multi-grain, dangit! It’s not like his name will look different!

Or...will it?

No, no that’s absurd!

But the absurd has become the normal ever since the soot turned white, hasn’t it?

Yes, but it has all been a different kind of absurd. More absurd in that things are different and weird, and not absurd in that his written name would be different depending on the type of flour.

With the brushy sounds from the soot arguing with himself making Ralsei less and less comfortable with the situation, he decides to just pour out both of the flours onto the work bench for the soot to write his name in. “N-Now you don’t have to choose.” The Darkner drags a hesitant smile that’s a bit too quick to be natural. “I-If I c-can’t read it in one w-we can try in the other.”

Sure…

Or something.

Beginning in the multi-grain flour, the soot begins his cursive signature with the back of a wooden spoon which he can’t see his own reflection in. It’s like painting, the way he dances with the spoon through the multi-grain flour. Weaving the lines into each other to form a sophisticated rendering of his proud name seldom spoken but always highly respected!

With slightly-gray flour dotting him, the soot steps aside with chest high and eyes closed. He straightens himself to then bow deeply with an arm presenting his written name in the multi-grain flour.

Isn’t it such a magnificent sight, Darkner Prince Ralsei?

…

Isn’t. It?

“Eh...he he he.”

What’s the matter? Can’t he read?

“C-Can I see how it looks in the normal flour, please? If that’s not too much to ask...” 

Urgh. Fine!

The soot does a second dance with his spoon in the normal flour spread out next to the patch of multi-grain. It’s not as elegant as the one before, but more functional, since apparently a Darkner prince can’t read the soot’s cursive. Once done, the soot doesn’t really bow, but instead flicks his arm straight with a huffing sigh to present his name for the Darkner prince.

Surely he should be able to read it.

Surely!

“Eh...he he he.”

You’re kidding?

“H-How about...um...m-maybe...ehrm...I s-should take a look ins-side Kris’ b-backpack to s-see what y-you L-Lightners brought with you.”

Unbelievable.

The soot shakes his head with disappointment so heavy that he has to lean on the wooden spoon on his elbow with one leg crossed over the other. 

Unbelievable that he can’t read what the soot wrote both beautifully and then functionally into the flour. True, he didn’t write those letters like Kris and Mrs. Toriel use in their house, but that’s because those ones are just so unnecessary and crass. What the soot writes is much, much better!

And if it’s much, much better it should be legible even to those who have never seen it before.

With saltshaker-like sounds, the soot clicks his tongue before sighing with disappointment at the Darkner prince rummaging through Kris’ backpack. Oh well, it’s not like the soot can do much more with the flour, so why not try and see what Ralsei is doing.

After a quick ocular survey, the soot sprite finds a long ladle which he shimmies down at an angle to the floor to then glide down on and wander over the alternating black and white squares on the floor. It’s still weird for him to blend in on the white ones rather than the black ones.

Once at Ralsei, the soor runs his hand over the fabric of the green robe swiping with each of Ralsei’s movement. It’s soft. Not as soft as what the soot’s clothes are made out of, but soft enough. Where did Ralsei put that knife that was used to stab the backpack?

Where did he…

Ah, there he did! On the work bench the soot was just on. Maybe he should have thought about that before he slid down the long ladle, but whatever. Climbing back up it isn’t a big deal. The knife, however, is. Quite big, actually. The handle is the length as the soot’s width, and the blade even longer. The soot can’t really lift it, but dragging it he can. First he clears a path for it to bring it over to the edge of the kitchen workbench, and then he dusts his hands and a part of himself as reserve to help measure out and cut the fabric necessary to make his hat and robe.

Ralsei is probably going to react to the knife hitting the floor though. The same with it bouncing and reflecting. That draws attention too. 

So what to do?

The soot’s hand disappears and reappears among the flour-tipped bristles as he taps his chin in thought. What he needs is a distraction that’s louder and more flashier than a dropped knife, but that’s at the same time not as alarming as a dropped knife. Putting it like that makes it sound absurd, but what really is absurd in this world of Darkners?

So the soot scours the ingredients set out onto the kitchen workbench. There’s the usual ingredients for when Mrs. Toriel bakes her pies, with sugar, flour, spices, and other various powders. One powder in particular the soot quirks an eyebrow towards, something he remembers that one Asriel doing with Kris a few years ago. It’s being kept in a cardboard container with a plastic lid that’s fastened pretty tightly.

The soot spins the container around to read and make sure that it is what he hopes it is. Written in bold letters, albeit the lesser ones that everyone else uses, makes his smile widen.

‘Baking Soda’

Oh yes, should do nicely.

“I’m soon d-done here, little creature,” Ralsei assures without looking. “You do not need to be afraid.”

The soot isn’t afraid. He isn’t afraid at all. In fact, he’s so jolly that he decides to whistle while he works. While he pushes a cookbook to the other side of the kitchen workbench and underneath the rim of a deep pot so that in angles up facing the edge of the workbench, leaning just enough over the side so that it doesn’t fall unprovoked, but will when provoked. He continues whistling while he fills a smaller, peppercorn glass container with baking soda and practices shoving the cork in really hard. Finally, while he scoops up a nice, deep spoonful of water that he brings over to the now baking soda-filled, small glass container with the cork lying on its side. 

With one final look over his shoulder to see where and how he should run to get to the knife lying opposite on the kitchen workbench, he stops his whistling, and pours the water to join with the baking soda.

Quicker than quick, the sprite shoves the cork to hold in the reaction for as long as possible while he rushes over to the knife, leaving a streak of fluttering flour behind him. Once at the knife, and with it safely clutched in his hands, the soot counts down.

He has no idea if he’s counting down correctly or-

“Gaah!” The prince Darkner jumps at the loud sound of the baking soda explosion and of the cork ricocheting off the inner of the pot. “What was that!” Before he can find the source of it though, he’s startled even more by the deep pot crashing onto the floor with even louder metallic bounces. The fur on his face explodes, and for a brief second he looks exactly like the soot sprite. “Aaaaah! Little creature!”

Feigning shock, the soot emerges from behind a box of breadcrumbs with his hand over his chest and his breathing pretend scared and heavy. He takes support against the breadcrumb package before leaning on it with his back and sliding down it with a relieved exhale. With a dramatic flick he wipes the sweat off his brow.

“Oh bless the Deltarune!” Ralsei exclaims with his own furry hand over the dark, split heart on his green robe. “I thought something had happened to you, little creature.” It doesn’t take long for him to find the source of his little start, a deep, metallic pot which lies tumbled just underneath the washing-up station. “Oh my.” He doesn’t give a second’s thought to the white foam inside it, as it’s identical to the soapy bubbles floating at the washing station. 

Before the soot can hurry to the knife which now lies on the floor out of Ralsei’s sight, he is interrupted by a gentle, warm breeze surrounding him. “Are you hurt?” worries Ralsei while caressing over the soot sprite with a yellow-glowing hand. “Do you need healing?”

No, no the soot does not need healing.

He’s...thankful that Ralsei offered though.

“Come to me at the backpack then when you want, okay?”

Yes, yes the soot will. He just needs to bring with him this little friend of his.

Although little might be the wrong word to use as it didn’t really get smaller even after the soot’s dastardly plan. A plan that actually worked out much better than he expected, because the knife bounced closer to where Kris’ backpack is!

The soot pushes up his glasses by the rim with a sinister smile stretching his lips thin.

It’s all exceeding keikaku!

A keikaku he brandishes in the reflection of the kitchen knife blade he holds insecurely underneath his white arm. The reflection of his glasses shining a blistering white from the old fluorescent lights humming from the ceiling, and that changes to a dark and green as the soot angles the blade towards Ralsei humming innocently. Each step the soot takes is heavy and cumbersome, with him swaying from side to side as the weight of the knife steers him rather than the opposite. Instead of a straight line towards the precious green fabric the soot sprite instead meanders in a cursive motion very similar to how he writes his own name across the black and white squares making up the kitchen floor.

He’s close!

He’s so close!

So close to getting out of this damnable-pink robe!

It’s right there! Right in front of him. Tufting and oscillating in rhythm with Ralsei’s pleasant humming. It’s not long until the reflection in the sharp blade becomes all green. All green for the soot to strike, and carve himself some new clothes!

But...why stop there? Ralsei has plenty of fur, doesn’t he? He can afford to part with some, just how the soot has parted Mrs. Toriel’s fur from the shower drain to decorate his loft among the attic beams. The soot will be black and green soon.

Very. 

Soon.

The soot sprite raises the knife above him, ready to become as he was finally!

“Yo Ralsei guess what I’m really freaking cool ‘cause I broke my loitering record by like three seconds and flicked a wooden, biodegradable toothpick next to a trashcan rather than in it and...”

A jarring shift in mood follows the loud slam of Susie barging into the kitchen with beaming, delinquent pride shining more innocently from her than Ralsei’s whistling could ever achieve. Like a lightning strike, the bright and loud is only for a few seconds before a confused silence replaces it. The reflection in the slightly-lowered knife shows Ralsei’s chin slightly agape from below. “S-Susie?” he stutters from the scared startle her barging in did. Seeing her eyes lowered by his feet though, he catches his own startled eyes in the polished metal of the kitchen knife held by the soot sprite just behind his right ankle. “Little cre-”

“I knew it!”

The roar from between the gritted teeth rings out with enough vigor and ferocity that the soot immediately drops the knife and makes a hurry for underneath the kitchen workbench. Before the knife hits the floor he has already reached halfway. “I knew you existed! Get back here!” In the slightly-less-polished metal of the kitchen workbench, the soot spots a hazy, blobby form closing in towards him with frightening speed. He jumps, narrowly dodging the thrown ax embedding itself into the panel of the kitchen workbench.

Heavy steps follows the thrown ax, and a purple blob in the kitchen panel precedes a large shadow closing in towards the soot just as he manages up onto the flat table. He tries one way, but a purple, muscular arm slams down with its spiky wristband making a hole in the wood. “Don’t even think about it!” thunders above him low and hungrily. His feet slips underneath him, and when he regains balance he finds the other large arm blocking his path the other way. They begin to close in on him, with the smile of his adversary growing more angled and victorious by the second.

“Got you now!” the growing grin declares just short of drooling. “Oh you’ve no idea how long I’ve waited for this moment!” The spikes of Susie’s wristbands scrape along the enveloping motion, carving deep chasms in the weathered wood. “Always been in the corner of my damn eyes during this entire last journey! You were the one that ate all the cake toppings, weren’t you? I can see the powdered sugar on your bristles. Now who are you!”

Heh…

Who is the soot?

You want to know who the soot is, Lightner?

Ha.

Hahahahahahahahaha!

The victorious smile turns slightly confused as Susie’s arms slow down their enveloping motion. Her brow both furrows in bewilderment and raises in doubtful recognition of the laughter as one. “What the hell are you...”

So you want to know who the soot is, ey? Want to make your introductions?

With a snap down towards the surface of the workbench, the soot diverts the unsure eyebrow along with the rest of the dumbfounded head down towards the squiggly lines carved similarly to the lines Susie has done with her wristbands into the wood, but with a much more sophisticated purpose, and with more grain than just the one the wooden top of the kitchen workbench is made out of.

“Are these...numbers? Letters?”

Having trouble reading the soot’s name? The come a bit closer. Bring your wrinkled muzzle and squinting eyes just a biiiiit closer.

“Is that a...”

Yes, yes it is. You’re so close. Just gotta look a bit closer.

“No, it’s...”

Actually, the soot should be nice. He should help the wrinkled muzzle and squinting eyes.

If she can’t read in the flour from where she is standing.

“Aargh!”

Then he should just bring the flour to her eyes instead!

“God! Freaking! Dammit!”

Multi-grain flour clumps worse than normal flour so enjoy your doughy eyes, Lightner! Ahahahahaha!

The pleased laughter has the soot sounding like a squeaky ball in a paint blender, but in his infinite hubris with both his hands firmly on his cackling stomach, he doesn’t notice the large, green hat closing in over him, turning his laughter muffled for a brief moment before he realizes what has happened.

Shit.

Oh well, should be easy enough to get out of the hat.

“Let me kill it!”

“N-No, S-Susie!”

“My eyes are full of dough, Ralsei!”

“T-The c-creature didn’t mean to.”

“What? Of course it did!”

Actually on second thought maybe the soot should stay inside the hat for now. The shouting from outside has the wide rim of the heavy hat lifting up a bit. Not wise to brave a storm, even less when you’re the one that created it. Might as well explore blindly for a bit to see what other things were caught inside the hat with the soot. Like with Kris’ backpack there exists a small hole at the top of the large hat allowing in some light for the soot to utilize. 

Immediately he recognizes the smell of poured-out peppercorn leading him over to the container of baking soda and the water he used to make the bomb before.

“Move it, Ralsei. I’m gonna show that thing or two before I-”

And which he uses to make another for the furious smile lifting up the rim of the hat with malicious peering and intent. It explodes right before her huffing nostrils, causing a panicked sneezing and hurried sputtering.

  


“AAARGH! MY EYES! NOT AGAIN!”

Now she won’t look under the hat again.

Good.

The soot has to thank the sneezing snivels though for peeking underneath the rim of the large hat, as it brought a bit more light to his situation. Especially to the loose threads holding a series of patches of green fabric just behind the again-opened container of baking soda. While Ralsei tries his best to try and calm the forceful sneezes down outside the hat, the soot takes the opportunity to relieve the loose threads of their tied-up situation, as well as the green patches they were holding. He squints in anticipation of the light that should with all reason blind him, but to his surprise he finds out that Ralsei’s hat is double-layered. 

Interesting.

The soot pokes his head in between the two layers of green fabric. Even without any sources of light he can still see that there’s nothing really interesting there. The interesting stops at the novelty of it being double layered.

Which is fair enough.

“Oh I so want to just split your hat in two, Ralsei.”

The outer layer, perhaps. 

“T-The c-creature isn’t dangerous, S-Susie. It’s j-just scared. It m-must have such troubles behind it.”

Not as much trouble as the soot has trying to sew while in the dark while using the spoke of a dull fork, that’s for certain. Eventually the soot has to concede and plucks a bristle to use as a needle instead.

“L-Listen, S-Susie. It’s w-weeping.”

Just...for the moment. Plucking a bristle hurts, and the soot was only doing so to handle the pain. He’s not crying.

With a sweep of his arm the soot removes the small clumps of multi-grain dough underneath his eyes.

He’s not crying at all…

Actually though!

Yes, yes he is crying!

He needs some dough. Enough dough to help make the indentations for his hat! One large cone in the middle and two small on either side to help keep balance. Plucking more bristles won’t help since he’s already cried enough for that, so what do?

“I hope it drowns in its own tears, because the next time I see it I’m gonna give it a piece of my mind!”

Oh, perfect!

“Why, S-Susie?”

While leaving one small dough cones to dry, as it was the only one he could make with the few tears he got from plucking his bristle, the soot walks over to where the hat brim is closest to the angry voice. Before he exits he takes a deep breath, and prepares himself emotionally. He crawls under the brim, and pokes his sooty head out into the light.

The scene the soot comes across is Susie brandishing the curved end of her ax just in front of Ralsei’s face. “The creature threatened you, Ralsei,” she states while bouncing the edge even closer to the wrinkled-back, black muzzle. “It. Threatened. You.” With the movement of the hat caused by the soot catching the corner of her eye, Susie spins around with her grin turning hungry. “There you are, you-”

Suffice it to say, and with Susie sufficing plenty with what she says, it doesn’t take long before the space between the soot’s eyes and glasses to overflow with tears as the angry Lightner throws everything she can and has over him. Pure and utter catharsis raining onto him like heavy boulder after heavy boulder. A puddle is all that’s left behind as the soot then zips into the hat again.

“Y-you m-made it c-cry, Susie.”

“Yeah...” There’s a long and introspective pause. “Yeah, I did! So what?”

While she spends her energy mustering up herself to show that it didn’t bother her, the soot runs with neck bent back to preserve as much moisture as possible. Once he feels the texture underneath his feet change he dumps his tears over the flour, and quickly sets to work making the remaining two dough cones. One large and one small. He had just enough tears to complete them.

The happiness he’ll gain from getting his green robe and green hat back will be enough to make the hurtful words drip off him. Nothing of what Susie said will stick with him.

Nothing.

Nothing…

“I t-think you should apologize to the little creature, S-Susie.”

Ralsei lifts up his hat so that she can apologize.

And then immediately slams it back down with a string of uttered “Sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry” flowing from his blushing face which he hides underneath his hands curled with embarrassment. 

It wasn’t his fault.

He couldn’t have known!

But yes, it still happened.

He still lifted up the hat while the soot was changing back into his normal-colored clothes.

“You...you outta apologize too, Ralsei.”

“Sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry!” continues to be meekly uttered from between the furry fingers as Ralsei shakes his head in an attempt to purge the image stuck on his retinas. His ears flop with each turn, slapping him over his finger like an angry teacher with a ruler. “I didn’t know! I didn’t know!”

There was a lot going on outside the hat, the soot figured by the muffled apologies seeping through the double-layered fabric. He doesn’t know why, as his head was buried inside his pink robe when Ralsei lifted up his hat. The sprite isn’t gonna be proud and dismiss the apologies though. After all, he had to take the fabric himself rather than it being offered to him by Ralsei, so fair enough that he feels the need to apologize as much as he’s doing.

Not a lot of apologizing coming from Susie’s way though.

With a rather small margin of error, the soot isn’t hearing any apologizing at all, as a matter of fact! Such insolence among the younger generation.

Tsk tsk tsk.

Once done and done, the soot adjusts his hat finally in a proper green to sit pretty upon his head again. He brushes off the few crumbs of dough left inside, and heads towards the rim of Ralsei’s hat to where his apologies sounds the loudest. Blinkingly, the soot emerges into the fluorescent light with a green rim covering the top of his vision once again!

He breathes in with fists pushed against his hips, turning and posing with eyes closed and bristled chin held high to bask in wearing green once more.

“Is that...from my hat?”

And doesn’t the soot just look so magnificent wearing it, ey? Doesn’t he look so great in green? His scarf might blend in with it, but no matter, the vast majority of his attire has gone back to normal!

Wait...his scarf.

It’s supposed to be pink, isn’t it?

The soot asks for a moment with a finger held up towards Ralsei peeking between his fingers.

“W-What?”

With a quick zip, the soot sprite dives underneath the hat again. After quickly feeling around for his old, pink clothes, he slowly feels around for the sharp bristle lest he accidentally stabs himself. During the time it takes for Ralsei’s sobs to fade into unsure snivels, the soot fashions himself another scarf in its proper pink color from his old robes. The heart that he was in the middle of his robe now flutters at the end of the scarf it has become as the soot again strikes a pose outside the hat. His arms come up to accept the applause that should be raining over him but isn’t, and he bows to the deafening silence hanging above him from Susie and Ralsei.

“What?” quips Susie this time. “Did you steal that from Ralsei’s hat?” 

It’s not stealing if the soot made something much better out of it, so no, he did not steal it from Ralsei’s hat. The soot appropriated the green fabric from Ralsei’s hat and remade it in a much more beautiful image.

His image.

“I-I guess i-if it m-makes you happy...”

It does. Very much so!

“You can’t encourage that though!” Susie protest with a diagonal swipe of her hand.

But he just did, didn’t he? Check and mate, Lightner!

“If others aren’t supposed to encourage my behavior then we shouldn’t encourage stealing out of a hat either.” The way Susie said it had her very close to a revelation, but luckily for her she wasn’t in a place where she actually needed to have that kind of revelation. She swiped diagonally in the air again, this time to cut the vague notion of the revelation in half so that it might never come back! “And did you just forget that it tried to stab you with a knife, Ralsei?” She didn’t have to use her ax this time around as she had used it plenty enough beforehand. “Tried to stab you then stole fabric from your hat!”

“B-But you tried to k-kill Lancer and Kris before didn’t you?”

The third swipe was even harder to be able to slash the revelation before it could catch ground. “That was different, Ralsei. You know, you were there. You’re here too, so you should know that it is different since you’ve been at both.”

Maybe the soot should retreat back inside Ralsei’s hat again so that he could be blessed with muffled silence again. This Lightner is ruining his moment of joy and delight having restored his old colors again! Well, restored his old colors again on his robe, hat, and scarf, but still!

“You know what?” Susie declares after not being able to face the four pair of green-hat-wearing eyes staring at her with lowered, confused brows. “I’m gonna go beat my loitering record again! It is a much better usage of my time rather than arguing with you tweeby nerds.” Her ax hits the underside of a cupboard as she swings it up on her shoulder, startling her enough to produce a quiet meep. Before the meep can settle though she clears her throat very cool and very toughly. “Just let me know when that nerd cake of yours is done, Ralsei?” An uneven smile flashes along the length of her muzzle. “So that you being on the awesome cake for me, and only me!”

Her insecurity-covering laughter echoes among the kitchen walls, only fading into quiet after she slams the door closed behind her. 

She leaves behind Ralsei and the soot standing like two question marks, and a few long seconds pass between them until they look at the other. 

“I g-guess she’s right that I shouldn’t reward s-stealing,” Ralsei whispers to himself after another few seconds of silence. “Even i-if I s-saw y-you n...” A harsh swallow passes down his throat. “So how about y-you help me bake, little creature?”

Help bake?

“P-Please?”

Will the soot get a slice?

“You can h-have a slice after it’s done.”

How about two?

“Maybe even two.”

This Darkner prince sure has a lot of experience with diplomacy. However, will he be able to bake a cake without proper toppings? How will he tackle that difficulty? Will he be able to rise and become king, or will he be disposed and shamed away from his throne of sponge?

An excellent dilemma, indeed! This the soot needs to be a part of! 

“Y-you will?” Ralsei perks up with his fists balled underneath his chin. His eyes sparkle softly, pleading with the soot sprite that the nod it did was true. Of course it was! The sprite is eagerly awaiting for the prince to get going, silly! “Alright! Yes, we can do this! Together!” He extends his index finger for the soot to meet in a cheerful...well...cheer. “Could you begin with the dry ingredients then? With the baking soda and such?” With effort to try and hide his amusement, Ralsei looks over to the still-foaming spots sprinkled around the kitchen workbench. “You seem quite...familiar with it.”

He could say that, yes.

And did.

After a straightened back and a respectful salute, the soot scurries off to begin mixing the ingredients and-

“S-Sorry!” 

Flour puffs up into small clouds as the soot coughs from Ralsei stopping him by grabbing onto his correctly-colored scarf. It was the only way he could get the soot to stop before it ran off without reading the recipe!

The Darkner prince then lifts over a weathered old tome written in quite archaic penship.“H-Here.” Seriously, who’d prioritize text looking pretty over readable? How ridiculous and stupid! “This page has the dry ingredients that we need for the sponges. It requires quite a bit of flour to be added and mixed. Are you sure you can add that much and mix it properly?”

In snarky response, the soot sprite removes his glasses for a moment so that he can make a furrowed side glance at the prince before replacing them with a dismissive scoff for dramatic effect.

Not trusting in that the soot can pour in a few scoops of flour?

Pah!

Insolent little prince.

Can’t be that many.

Once the soot reads the amount of flour necessary though he has to remove his glasses again to clean them with his scarf. A third time as well, as he obviously didn’t clean them good enough.

That can’t be right…

“Hm?” Ralsei wonders over his shoulder enough to have his long ear slip over it. “What is it, little creature?” He leans in closer to where the soot is hastily pointing with a confounded look blurred by the shaking of his bristle-covered head. “About the amount of flour? If it is correct?” Ralsei takes a second look, but to him it is correct. It matches the other amounts written on the page too. The ratios necessitate the flour to be that much. “It looks correct to me?”

But…

How big is it going to be?

With mild panic, the soot sprite moves his arms out and in to try and get somewhat-accurate measurement of how big the cake is going to be. Just so that he can get a sense of it.

“Oh!” Ralsei manages to understand what the soot means after a few oscillations. “About this big.”

About...that…

Enormous!

That’s like… twice the length of the knife’s blade! That’s absurdly large! What is the prince thinking? That the cake will feed this entire world or something? Probably this world and the normal one too! So much cake.

Too much cake!

Almost.

Can never have enough cake, but apparently Ralsei is wanting to test that hypothesis for some strange reason! Is that how he’ll be king instead of a prince or something? To bake the biggest cake there ever was?

The soot never thought this day would come, but he is starting to feel respect for the Darkner prince. To undergo such a massive undertaking of making a cake that’s just a bit more in diameter than two knife blades and with the height the height of two of those blades stack on top of each other really requires the spirit of royalty to have confidence and a lineage to draw upon.

“Eh...”

Truly, the soot feels honored about being entrusted with sharing the prince’s burden.

“W-Why are you kneeling, l-little creature? Come on, s-stand up, please.”

Yes, yes the prince’s words speak true! The soot can not just kneel idly and just make a token effort to show his allegiance to this trailblazer of a prince. No, he must do his duty diligently and without falter or fear. The soot will help the Darkner prince into eternity and immortality, as the coming generations will sing his name in praise and reverence!

“I’m...just gonna continue with the wet ones then.”

Do so, brave prince. Your trust in the soot sprite will not be forgotten, nor will you regret handing over that trust in this time of- blaargh!

“Oh dear.”

No, no the soot don’t need your help, prince. Go back to your wet ingredients once more. It was just a waywardly-placed bag of flour that the soot walked into as he spun on his heel with chin high and step long.

Right into the bag.

The new-yet-old green sleeves the soot rolls up to be fully at the ready to take on this daunting task that the prince has laid out for him. He will face this looming bag of…

Wait, which flour was it again?

With an eye onto Ralsei so that he doesn’t turn around and becomes disappointed in the soot for forgetting already, the sprite returns to the opened book resting on a can of brown sugar. He adjusts his glasses slightly as he reads.

Let’s see here…

Multi-grain flour, it is.

Right.

Luckily for the sprite that bag is a bit more empty than the one with the normal flour in it. Still...very...heavy...to...drag...across...the...table...though. Can’t be going about sweating all over it though, as that would just clump the flour. Breathe in and out. Cool yourself!

Now, for the measurements.

The soot leans the bag up onto a metal bowl. A heavy one, allowing him to balance on the rim of it. With a plastic one it would just tip over.

Using the soft-rubber lid of a container of bicarbonate, the soot springs up onto the metal rim of the bowl. He takes a walk around its circumference to get a feel for the balancing, and makes it around the rim a full circle easily. His next round, the soot puts a bit more flair into, with a dance that has his scarf following along like the tassels of a ballerina. His feet lands with good footing even when he jumps for a pirouette. Same story for when he lands on one foot with his arms spread out like a bird.

Yes, this will do nicely.

With a small skip, the soot dismounts from the metal bowl down onto the wooden work surface to fetch the key-chain of measurement cups. He counts them one by one. Pinch. Tea spoon. Table spoon. Hundred milliliter. Deciliter.

All of them have their measurement written on the bottom along with a drawing of Ralsei’s head smiling to encourage the user. The prince has thought of everything! Oh praise him! Praise him until forever!

With his tools half-secure in his hands, the soot again jumps up onto the rim of the bowl via the freshness-lock function of the soft-rubber lid. Unfortunately, as he does, the measurements come apart from being nestled neatly into each other. It has the soot struggling to keep balance as the pinch measurement and table spoon measurement strike at his face from two different angles. He manages to keep balance for four fully-finicky steps before the deciliter measurement swings into the bowl, taking the sprite with it. 

The soot slides down the inner curvature of the bowl with the measurements all over him like poorly-functioning wings. He glides up the other side, but not enough to allow him to reach the rim, or to throw the measurements up like hooks to then help him pull himself up. He slides down again, stopping at the bottom of the metal bowl with his hat in disarray, and the measurements around him even more so.

Huh…

This wasn’t something he had planned to happen. No, no not at all. The metal is too slick for him to get a grip trying to crawl his way up it. Had he some flour left he could have made some dough to climb up with, but alas, he has none. 

So what to do?

“Little creature?”

Call for help?

“I thought I heard something. A-Are you alright?”

And disappoint the prince?

“Hello? Little creature?”

Would disappoint him less than not helping him bake the cake though.

“W-Where are you?”

Wielding the deciliter measurement like a hollow, plastic hammer, the soot strikes it against the inside of the metal bowl. The sound and reverberation has his entire body shaking along, with his bristles bouncing for seconds longer than he does. 

The soot’s bristles are calm when Ralsei peeks his curious head into the bowl. “Oh,” he reacts with a mix of surprise and sympathy. “Did you fall in?” His regal status grants him the ability to state the obvious. “Here, let me help you out.” His soft, furry hand is comfortable for the soot sprite, who sits down pretty with the measurements trailing behind him as he’s lifted out of the bowl and placed back down onto the work surface. “Were you scared, little creature?”

...Yes, actually.

A bit.

The soot knew that Ralsei was there though, so he wasn’t as scared as he could have been. One time he got stuck inside the kitchen sink at Kris’ house for almost three hours when he was but a teeny-tiny little soot sprite. He couldn’t sit still during those three hours either, as if he did he would have fallen down the dark holes leading to somewhere even darker and…

Small tears carve a path down the soft fur of Ralsei’s thumb that the soot embraces as hard as he can. The memories...they’re so scary! The soot was so scared back then!

“Ooohhh, you poor thing.”

Another warm finger comes to stroke the bristled cheek sobbing heavily.

“If you don’t want to, then that’s fine. I understand that it can be very scary for someone your size. You can sit on my shoulder if you want and watch if that’s better for you, little creature?”

No.

The soot scares the scary memories away with one last, determined sob. He wipes his eyes quickly, and marches back to the plastic measurements hanging on the edge of Ralsei’s palm. The soot shoulders the deciliter measurement, and stands with honor facing the prince he swore to help. One more stroke below his nose is the last he does to be back and ready to help with the baking!

“You...um...need to wash your hands again now. The baking soda and water mixture you did before did clean your hands, but I’m afraid you will have to do it again now.”

That’s...fair enough. 

Yes, the soot will.

B-but not...b-but not at the s-sink.

Ralsei catches on to the soot’s worried look towards the kitchen sink. “Also a bit big for you?”

The soot nods.

“Can fall in that one too?”

And again.

An understanding smile parts the black fur to reveal again the white, gentle row of softly-shapen teeth. “Then wait here and I’ll bring some soap and water for you, okay?” Ralsei also takes a look at the metal bowl. “I should try and figure something out for you for the bowl as well.”

The soot jumps down from the prince’s hand back onto the work surface. With the deciliter measurement upside down as a chair, he sits down with his feet tapping on the work surface’s wood while he waits. He watches as the prince fills a bowl with warm water and soap to begin with. “This enough?” he asks over his shoulder to the soot who nods. It will be like a bath for him, so it’s plenty enough. “Then how about the bowl...”

The prince’s fingers drum on the rim of the sink, with an idea straightening the folded tip of his hat. He snaps his fingers, “Aha!” and shoves his rolled-up arms deep into the sink. “Come on, come one,” Ralsei utters after a bit of wet rummaging. “Kris and Susie played with these earlier. They have to be here!”

While the soot did want to help out as it looked like the prince was straining himself trying to find whatever it was that he was looking for within the quietly-sizzling mountain of bubbles, it wasn’t really a situation the soot would be very helpful in. If anything he’d become lost within the bubbles, never to be seen again. Had he been his black, sooty self he would’ve been visible, but not really with the white he was. The green and pink of his clothing was too similar to the refracting colors cast through the soap to boot.

“There’s one… Two… Three...” The prince’s tongue tipped out of his mouth to help him stretch his arm further. “...Four? Maybe?” A wayward bubble gently descents from the top of the mountain the prince is underneath, and before the soot can warn, the bubble pops on the outstretched tongue, causing Ralsei to recoil back while blowing cleaning raspberries to abscond the taste away from him. “Bleargh! Ptfwii!”

It takes a couple of loud smacks of his tongue for his scrunched-up expression to loose its tight grip on his face. “I am-” He’s forced to interrupt himself with a final regal raspberry to cleanse his princely palette. “I am sorry, little creature.” His apology is said with as little movement as possible from his tongue, which he fears for a bit more to properly nestle inside his mouth again. 

A few guesses passes through the soot’s mind as Ralsei approaches back to the workbench while drying the three...four things he picked up from within the soapy mountain with the use of a towel with sewed-in instructions on how to best use it. “I think these should be helpful.” It’s not until he reaches where the soot is sitting that Ralsei reveals the bouquet of large plastic forks used for pasta that the soot gets a good, dry look at what will apparently help him out.

Understandably, the soot looks a bit confused as to how the plastic forks are supposed to help him. He flicks at one of the dull, long teeth of one of the large forks, but apart from a surprisingly melodic tone, nothing else comes to his mind about them.

“I was thinking like this,” reveals Ralsei while placing the empty space between on of the forks’ teeth inside the handle of another, effectively creating a crude ladder of sorts. Continuing with the remaining two forks, the makeshift ladder manages to reach up over the rim of the metal bowl while standing on the bottom of the bowl. “Try it,” Ralsei urges while offering to help the soot inside. One look at the creation has it looking quite flimsy.

If he says so…

And as the soot predicted, as soon as he grips onto the bottom to heave his weight up onto the ladder, it slides down. The prince catches the ladder before it hits the soot though, and angles it up again. “Hm...” he thinks before his eyes locks onto the hole in the upper fork’s handle. “Aha again!”

With the help of some string and a ceramic mug filled with rice, the ladder is anchored enough that the soot can rush up the ladder as fast as he can without it budging at all! Even when the soot jumps onto the middle part of the ladder it doesn’t move. It bends and flexes, but doesn’t move. 

Great!

Such brilliance from the prince!

“Before you begin though,” the brilliant prince says before the soot moves before he thinks. With a quick little jog over back to the sink, Ralsei fetches the bowl of warm and soapy water. He brings it to the bench and places it next to the soot. “Gotta wash yourself.”

Oh yeah!

Again, good thinking from the prince!

Quickly, the soot washes his hands and face after having taken off his glasses to let them soak in the water as well. There are a few dry spots left on the towel Ralsei used for the plastic forks, which the soot uses. No need to be wasteful, after all.

“Let me watch you pour in the first scoop of flour so that we’re both sure that it works, okay?” Ralsei then suggest with a small step back to not be in the way for the recently-washed-and-dried soot sprite. “Take your time.”

Time the soot has already wasted enough of though!

With spring in his step, and added spring from the rubber lid, the soot wields the deciliter measurement with renewed gusto high and mighty! Like a shovel digging for gold, the soot fills the measurement full and feisty. Using the momentum of him swinging the heavy measurement around out of the bag, the soot then follows it into the bowl where the two settle after another short ride down one side and up the other side slightly less. The soot pauses before pouring the flour out to bask a bit in succeeding. The first is always the most difficult one, and with it poured out into a half-similar shape of the measurement cup as it spreads out on the bowl bottom, the soot does a cheer with a happy jump for joy only to skitter up the ladder for another cup!

“Seems like you have things figured out now, little creature,” prince Ralsei congratulates with a nod to his head. 

Yes, yes the soot has!

“Then I’ll let you continue on your own.”

Yes, yes he will, prince! The first cup is in, so now comes the others. The second scoop the soot shoves into the multi-grain bag of flour, readying himself to-

But wait!

Wait.

He can’t do the same thing again. Not the same he did with his first cup. Doing so will have him slide straight down into the flour that’s already there. The soot can’t get caught up in his enthusiasm. He can be happy, yes, but he still needs to focus. He’s still scooping up flour that weighs very close to what he does, so he must be careful. He needs a more methodical method.

Hm…

Maybe that makeshift ladder can be useful down too rather than just up? 

With a few, calm taps with the measurement on the rim of the metal bowl to get Ralsei’s attention, the soot points over to the ladder leaning on the opposite handle than what the bag of flour is. “What is it?” After getting the prince’s attention the soot then hurries around the rim to the fork ladder and begins pushing it. It moves a bit, but with the weight getting stuck in the handle he can’t push it far. He points again over to the bag, which has the prince understanding. “Move it over there?” 

The soot nods.

Like a sailor up in the crow’s nest, the soot sprite hangs on with a hand over his eyes to look out while he and his ladder is lifted over next to the bag of flour. The base of the ladder Ralsei digs into the one spread-out cup of flour for support. “This good?” 

Oh yes, very good, prince.

Because now the soot can put one foot securely on the top part of the interlocked fork ladder and one foot on the rim to get good leverage and heeeaaaavveee the cups of flour into the metal bowl. It’s been a while since he has done such manual labor, but the burn in his big, strong arms is that of honest work, and brings him nothing but a good, hearty feeling of having done good. 

So good so that he allows himself a break after three cups to kiss the marvel that is his biceps. To flex and admire his pecs and shoulders in the reflection of the metal bowl.

Oh yes, big and strong! What he needs to be to bake the perfect, princely cake. 

“Are you hurt, little creature?”

W-wha-

No! No he wasn’t doing anything! He was just taking a breather, prince!

“I heard some strange, strained sounds.”

No no no no no no.

Nothing at all.

“If you say so, little creature.”

A shame, really, for the soot to have to hide the gun show for the prince, but the soot can’t have the prince fall in love with him. That can’t do. If the soot displays the full caliber of his gun show, then the prince won’t be able to think of anything else, and how can he bake a cake that way then?

Truly, a tragedy unlike any other!

But the soot must soldier on. There’s more flour to add. Not too much flour though, as that will make the cake sponge dry and imply too much gluten into the mix causing it too not be as fluffy as it is supposed to be.

And if the prince not being able to watch the gun show was a tragedy then the ruined sponge cake would be...something else than a tragedy.

For in the more ancient sense of the word, a tragedy only happened to people of importance, such as princes.

Oh yes, that one book the soot read once sure did come in handy from time to time!

And speaking of books, now with all the cups of flour added, the soot outta make sure he has the other measurements correctly too. Compared to heaving flour they should be easy as pie.

Or cake, in this case.

With the flour-dusted deciliter measurement again slung over his shoulder, the soot jumps off the rim of the flour-saturated metal bowl and heads over to the recipe book with a jolly whistle following him like his flowing scarf.

“Done with the flour?” inquires Ralsei while beating some eggs into his wet ingredients. In response, the soot raises the deciliter measurement high and proudly, but not high enough that he accidentally flashes the prince the gun show. 

Phew, close one!

“How wonderful, little creature! I’m just about done with the wet ones, so this is perfect timing.”

Anything for you, prince.

Now, let’s see, what was the rest that the soot needed…

Salt, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and…

And…

And?

Nutmeg? Crushed peppercorn?

What in the…

This can’t be right, can it? None of that were in the crumbs of Mrs. Toriel’s pies. How come in here? 

The soot looks over his shoulder with one eyebrow raised over the rim of his glasses. One the one hand, who is he to question the brilliance of Prince Ralsei who apologizes profusely while cracking another egg into his bowl. “I’m so so so so sorry that I couldn’t find egg substitutes. It dims the shine inside me that you are too delicious not to use, tiny egg.” Who is the soot to question such an innocent and understanding soul that goes to such lengths to even apologize to the eggs for having to be used? Who is the soot, who only has a page of context to the volumes of books that the prince must have lived throughout his life, to question the prince he has pledged his life to?

On the other hand though…

Crushed peppercorns in a cake mix?

What in darnation?

“Hm? Little creature?” Yes, please come and help the soot get sense of this, prince. Otherwise he’ll wear down his bristles on his head by scratching them down to just teeny tiny nubs. “About the peppercorns?”

Yes.

Pray tell.

“I have no idea.”

…

“Well actually, I have one idea.”

Please go ahead.

“But it’s...”

Just!

Please, prince!

“O-Okay, I’ll t-try.”

Thank you!

Ralsei reaches over for the peppercorns strewn from the soot using their small glass container to make his makeshift baking soda bomb. On the way back, the prince’s hands picks up a mortar and pestle in which he places the peppercorns. “Peppers, once ground up, have a slight fruity tang to them among their spiciness. If you sift them a few times you can spread out the spiciness in a way and retain some of that fruity tang.” With smooth motions of the prince’s wrist, the peppercorns are subdued from their corny appearance into a fine, brown-black powder using the instructions-ridden…

Wait, which one is which again?

“This?” the prince asks to clarify to the soot’s pointing at the blunt object in his hand. “This is the pestle.”

Right, okay.

With smooth motions of the prince’s wrist, the peppercorns are subdued from their corny appearance into a fine, brown-black powder using the instructions-ridden pestle. Strangely enough, the soot can actually smell the faint, fruity tang from the stone mortar. His brow sinks behind the round rims of his glasses as he smells the air.

While the prince’s intentions of holding out the pestle for the soot sprite was in good faith, the fruity tang was still weak compared to the fresh spiciness wringed out of the peppercorns. It surprises the soot sprite with how strong it smells just a finger’s length away from his nose, and his sneeze sends him flying back, leaving his glasses and hat to flutter before falling down.

“Oh dear!” passes through Ralsei’s fingers held up to his mouth before he too succumbs to the fresh spice that he just did grind up. “Achoo!” All it does for him to is misplace his glasses further out on his dark muzzle, as well as tilting the double-layered brim of his hat down over his glass-deprived eyes.

Having been saved from flying too far back, the soot finds himself between the pages of the recipe book. His vision is blurry, but the bright color of his scarf helps him find his glasses without much effort besides his strained eyes. He crawls over to them, with the small circles of clarity growing larger and larger until they come together as one that encompasses his restored vision. The end of his scarf helps him wipe his nose. Having to take the ten or so steps over to the soapy water would just be wasted time.

Or something along those lines.

“Oh b-boy,” coughs the prince before he blows his nose with a handkerchief embroidered with his name. “M-Maybe it’s a bit too much spice with these peppercorns.” He lifts away the mortar and pestle with a fearful look at it. “W-We’ll j-just skip that then.”

But…

The recipe?

The sacred text?

Ralsei is a prince, yes, but wouldn’t it require a king to against the ancient instructions? Were the two about to be attacked?

Attacked through the door that was kicked open!

“Holy smoky! I found a new sign that prohibits being me near Rouxls’ store, Ralsei! I’m gonna head over there with Kris to see if I can’t switch clothes or something so that Rouxls will have to make a new sign! Just letting you know!”

Yes, but not really in the sense that the soot imagined. The sense was much worse. Much, much worse. That poor kitchen door has had it rough the entire day.

On the positive side though the flour in the metal bowl evened out from Susie kicking in the door and then just as violently closing it shut, so at least there’s that.

However slim a silver lining that is compared to the fluorescent light fixtures risking to come loose. Had they been flourescent lights then fair enough, but fluorescent dust is even more spicier than freshly-ground pepper, so maybe not with that, if the soot got to choose.

And speaking of choosing.

“I-If you want to add the pepper then you can do that, little creature,” said Ralsei to the soot tapping onto the line in the recipe book asking for the pepper to be added. “B-But if it’s gonna be that spicy I don’t know, really...”

Hm…

What if?

Quirking an eyebrow, the soot heads over to the mortar and pestle with courage building up inside of him. He breathes in and out hard through his nose, clearing it up. Like a little locomotive his tracks are set towards the mortar with rhythmic huffs. Once at it, the soot climbs up to the pestle lying across the thick, stone rim. With one more cleansing inhale and exhale, he faces his destiny!

A face that scrunches up trying to fight against the spice assaulting him from the rounded tip of the pestle. He holds the building sneeze in, even when the tears come flooding. As they fade, he takes another inhale, deeper and closer! Again his face resembles that of a piece of paper crushed and rustled, but again he holds his sneeze in.

He...holds...it...in!

Enough that for the third sniff, he doesn’t feel anything. He smells it, it smells just the same, but he doesn’t feel like sneezing!

Success!

Now he just has to sift through for the fruity tang inside the mortar and the pepper can be added.

Prince!

“Y...yes, little creature? Ralsei says to the soot standing tall with one finger raised as high as he can.

The pinch measurement, if you would?

After an impressed nod at the soot’s respectful bow, the prince hands over the measurement, stopping for a moment of confusion to try and take in the strange, happy energy the soot shines with as he jumps into the mortar with an ecstatic bounce.

The fruity tang of the prince’s labor will not go to waste!

And not to waste they did, as after a few minutes of face-tensing picking of the fruitiest spots the soot had filled up the pinch measurement with tangy pepper powder. With the measurement at length he transported it to the metal bowl where he added the pepper carefully. It came to rest as a thin layer on the slightly-gray flour, which had the soot wondering what the final color of the dry mixture would be. He didn’t have to wonder for long though, as the baking soda and baking powder was nearby. The two brought back light to the mixture, hiding away the dark of the pepper.

The soot hummed before it could settle with him.

Sugar was next, and just the smell of the inside of the bag caused the soot’s eyes and pupils to widen. Some good sugar, it is. After the boost of energy which he spent running back and forth with the filled deciliter cups, he found himself in a bit of a low afterwards. Not enough to not have him fetch the last spice though.

Nutmeg.

Nutmeg that scared away the low with it smelling even more strongly than the freshly-ground pepper was. His bristles stood on end, stiffening briefly like a zap of electricity running through them.

Good stuff here as well.

As the fine cloud of nutmeg settles onto the top of the dry mixture, the soot finds himself a bit perturbed by the prospect of homogenizing it all. It’s like a painting of sorts, a canvas of metal upon which rests the ingredients in their finest forms, literally. Does that make the art fine if the paints are fine as well? Does the properties inherit to the parts that make up the whole effect the whole? Can beauty still be beauty if it is made out of all parts ugly? If so, can ugly be from parts of beauty? Is one different than the other, and if so who gets to decide? 

The soot walks around the rim of the metal bowl with his hand stroking his chin with radiating intelligence. 

Dark, and white.

Pepper, and flour.

Salt too, but that’s too cliché.

Just as how the pepper rests darkly upon the white flour, so too can beauty pertain ugly, and vice versa. But again, who gets to choose which one is which? What is dark and what is light? Lightners and Darkners, which ones are the real ones? Is there even a real one? Are they perhaps two halves of a whole? Why half? Maybe the ratio is different?

For the flour and pepper it certainly is? Cups upon cups of flour don’t leave as big an impact as just a pinch of pepper, so balance does not necessarily have to be in the middle. One beauty may equate to several ugly, and vice versa. 

The former would be nice though.

Yes, that the soot would love to be.

And for that to be, the worlds needs more cake. All the parts of beauty that he has added have to come together to an even greater sum! 

For the soot!

For the prince!

For the world!

A determined bite has the weight on the fork ladder snapping off and alerting Ralsei who turns to see the soot mixing the dry mixture by running the fork ladder around the rim of the metal bowl. As he does, a dry spiral of light-gray, white, black, and brown come together tighter and tighter until it finally succumbs to the homogenization and turns a beautiful…

Gray.

Rather depressingly gray, actually.

That wasn’t supposed to happen.

Dang it.

It is with a disappointed pout that the soot nods for the prince to pour in the wet mixture. “Can you manage to mix while I pour?” Yes, yes the soot can.

It’s his art.

It’s his responsibility.

The depressingly gray mixes well with the wet mixture poured slowly by the prince, as he does it slowly enough that the soot can adjust to the added weight without it becoming too heavy too quickly for him. The soot keeps his eyes on the mixture turning more and more back into white with the added milk and eggs. With the half of the wet mixture poured in the gray becomes as light as the multi-grain flour was, and once the final drops plonk down onto the stirred surface, the white is back completely.

“May I?” asked the prince with his hand opened for the fork ladder which the soot hands over. He pushed the fork down, dragging it around on the bottom of the bowl. “I’m n-not doing this because I don’t think you did a bad job, little creature,” Ralsei explains while he stirs his extra. “I-It’s b-better if we b-both have, right?”

Suppose so, prince?

The soot hops off the metal bowl to allow Ralsei to stir without fear of pushing the soot in. It’s not good of an artist to drown inside their art, especially not when the art is supposed to become something even more delicious!

What a shame that would be.

He can taste it though, right? Indulging just a bit in your own art isn’t bad. Gotta have a taste to make sure you did it right, and to enjoy a bit as an added motivator. To take a step back from having gone through the process of all the parts and to enjoy the whole for a spell. The soot may know that he accidentally put in a bit too much flour and sugar, but no one else will, because it’s part of a whole, and if someone notices then that’s fine. It’s a mistake, things like that happen, but the important part is that it becomes good enough.

Because good enough isn’t something negative.

Good enough always leaves room for improvement!

And who doesn’t enjoy improving?

“Here you go, little creature. Have a taste.”

Oh boy though. Improving from this cake mixture is gonna be tougher than anything tough that has ever been undertaken before.

The soot will make the next one better though! This he swears even before the cake is baked! 

He does not move forward too quickly! It’s the world that’s too slow for him!

“Maybe a bit too much sugar...” whispers Ralsei under his breath seeing the soot bounce around excitingly with his hat and scarf whipping around like in a storm after having tasted some of the mixture from the end of the fork ladder.

The cake form that Ralsei takes out from a cupboard again reminds the soot of how large the cake will actually be. The forms at Kris’ house are all short in height for when Mrs. Toriel bakes her pies, but the cake form the sprite can’t see over even if he stands up on his toes. His feet kick to try and get footing on the side as he pulls up his body up on the rounded rim. His bristles twing and twang as they’re pushed together and then pluck as he tumbles over and into the form.

His hat is squished, but with a determined and flipped snap the tip straightens out again. With the top of his vision brimmed again, the soot surveys the cake form. It’s quite big, as the outside of it did hint at. The soot could actually live inside it, come to think of it.

Yes…

With his fingers extended and his thumbs touching, the soot closes one as he imagines where his different furniture would be.

The sofa clad in green would be in that corner of the circular form, as that would placed it in a good central feeling to build everything around. Standing next to it would be a proud and old bookshelf and a nice little lamp to give the general area a sorta ye’ olde librarby feel. Coffee table in front, wooden with weathered stains of coffee rings, otherwise it wouldn’t be a coffee table if there wasn’t any coffee on it, right?

Then in that other corner of the circular cake form would go the entryway with the statues of the soot and prince Ralsei flanking the red carpet showing the way from the door into the living room where the aforementioned green sofa would go.

A humbling entrance to give way to a humble living room. 

Entertainment lounge with a snooker table and indoor pool would go a bit more to the side so that it wouldn’t risk ruining the upholstery of the sofa or damage any of the self-penned autobiographies detailing the soot’s life that fill up the entire bookshelf.

Forewords from Prince Ralsei himself, naturally.

Moving along, if the guests would be able to, the next room would detract a bit from the olive-brushed wooden floor to the metal of the cake form in the stone-heated sauna. Would be difficult to walk on when the sauna is ignited, but no one has any business being on the floor if they’re in a sauna. The heat transferred through the metal of the cake form will help with heating the rest of the house, so it’s a good investment.

Finally, the kitchen.

“Butter?”

A good idea, prince, but a buttery yellow for the walls won’t really bring forth the sophistication the soot is looking for. It would be better with a more subtler brown, kinda like the grounded nutmeg? Something to be distinct from the olive-brushed of the living room, but not too distinct for it to be jarring jump and more a gradual fade. You shouldn’t notice that you walked into a new room until you’re already at the heart of it, that way-

A large stick of butter ploofs down heavily before the soot, crushing his view of his new house with a fatty, savory thud. 

“Oops!” meeps Ralsei from above. “I thought it was cold enough to stick!”

Oh how is the soot gonna be able to explain this situation to the contractors?

Using the not-cold-enough wrapper, the prince lifts up the stick of butter again, only the then slice off a smaller piece along with some of the wrapper. “You wouldn’t mind buttering the pan, little creature?” The prince demonstrates by moving the butter around inside the pan via his finger on the wrapper gliding around on it. “I’ll check on the oven and prepare for the glazing while you do, okay?”

Sure, the soot can do that. 

But only if the prince cuts up the wrapper a bit and dices up the butter while he’s at it.

“I...I can do that.”

Cut up the wrapper and dice the butter so that the soot can surf on it, of course!

If he can’t make a cake form a house and a home, then the next best thing is to surf in it.

Of course.

With haste lest the pieces of butter becomes too melted, the soot places the diced pieces spread around inside the cake form with enough distance between them to make it interesting for him. He’s always wanted to try this while watching Mrs. Toriel butter the pie pan from up in the rafters of Kris’ kitchen. Like painting a painting, almost.

But that’s not sophisticated enough for the soot’s taste. Surfing across pieces of butter is sophisticated enough though, as well as very cool. It’s a good thing the soot is only wearing glasses and not sunglasses otherwise there would’ve been frost all around him from how cool he would be. The butter would just be shredded and not at all spread out in an even layer to help prevent the cake form from sticking. 

So with the piece of wrapper he specified to Ralsei to be cut, the soot lines up the first few pieces of diced butter. He makes a mental note of how soft they look to adjust the angle of attack for best speed and mobility.

He has no idea which angle he needs to attack with, but he knows that there is one for best speed and mobility.

But how hard can it be to hit it?

Initially, not that hard. With a good run up and a lucky angle, the soot manages a few pieces of half-melted butter with a good speed and balance on his slightly-bent knees. Unfortunately, his speed slows down earlier than his balance suggested which has him leaning too much forwards when it comes to him having to turn to continue. The soot flails his arms to keep balance, but to no avail. Before he falls, he realizes that maybe he should have removed his scarf beforehand as it slaps against his glasses to obscure his vision.

“Oh, by the way, little creature. You need to butter the...walls...as...well...”

Standing on his hands and the bent top of his hat, the soot’s legs have slid up the wall of the cake form, with a trail of painted butter up on it from him catching his balance with his legs pushed against the wall.

It’s not really a respectful pose or sight.

“I’ll...let you c-continue, little creature.”

Yes...sure.

The soot planned for this.

Yes…

Sure…

Now he just needs to plan himself back on his feet again.

Easy enough, to the soot’s luck, as there’s still some butter on the underside of the piece of wrapper underneath his feet up on the wall, so it’s just to slide down again. Once back on his feet on thicker metal that’s not slick with melted butter, the soot sprite adjusts his scarf away from his glasses and flicks up his hat once again.

Surfing on butter wasn’t as sophisticated as he thought. It’s better to just do it normally. That’s the most sophisticated way, the soot figures.

And he figures very smartly and sophisticated, as always.

First the walls with one spot clean so that the soot doesn’t butter himself in a corner of the circular cake form, and then from the inside and out. Long and methodical strokes of the wrapper in front of him. Each little spot covered in butter once he’s done, yellow and thick. The soot has a few seconds to admire his work before he has to climb out and away from the slithering butter creeping closer to his clean spot as it continues to melt. Once up on the rim the soot makes one final sweep to cover his clean spot.

Then finished!

Celebratory confetti rains from the sky to commemorate a job well done!

“Breadcrumbs to give a nice texture for the cake.”

Eh, close enough, it is confetti to the soot’s eyes.

And because of that he outta clean the oil away from his glasses before it gets stuck too much. His walk over to the soapy water is without any taken risks, as it is not sophisticated to walk into something and shatter one’s glasses into oily pieces.

Never has been, never will be!

“Your glasses needed some cleaning, little creature?”

As soon as the soot dries them off with his scarf he will answer that, prince.

“Can see better now?”

Yes, now he can, prince.

“Since I’m guessing you want to see me pour in the batter?” Ralsei slightly lifts the filled metal bowl in his hands to show. “I-If that’s fine with you, of c-course.”

Fine with the soot. The prince needs to set up a bit of a gun show of his own, the soot feels. A future king needs to be strong, after all.

Slowly, the thick batter sneaks over to the edge of the tilted metal bowl. It curiously caresses the thin rim with a mesmerizing slowness to it before the batter pushed from behind enough to convince it to finally be poured. The impact onto the layer of breadcrumb-covered butter is quite calm, as it’s not from a great height it is poured. Like with the melted butter, the viscous batter spreads itself out in the metal form, rolling over the many sprinkled crumbs sleepily and slowly. At the walls the batter is reluctant to continue and actually touch it due to the butter, but the convincing pushes it receives from the continued pouring has it rising upwards, until finally it comes to a rest halfway-and-a-bit-more up the cake form’s walls. 

With the help of a rubber spatula, the prince folds out the batter that didn’t feel like being poured, but is needed regardless. His actions is law, and even the viscous cake batter is under his rule. Left is but a few drops of cake at the rim of the metal bowl as the prince concludes a job well done. “There we go.” One of the few drops fall off as he retreats the emptied bowl from the filled cake form.

A drop that the soot hurries over to catch in his hand. It splats onto his bristles, but luckily not onto his glasses. He samples the splattered drop on his tongue.

Within the sugar and savory taste there is a slight tang of fruitiness from the nutmeg and ground, sifted peppers!

“Does it taste good, little creature?” asks Ralsei seeing the soot think about the taste that he just sampled.

A cake fit for a prince, prince! Fit for a king, even, prince!

“Looks like you’re enjoying it. I’m so very happy to see that, little creature. It makes my soul shine seeing someone else enjoy my baking, as much as it makes my soul shine when someone else wants to help and bake with me.” He then scratches at his cheek. “You got a few drops here and here.”

The soot turns around to lick the spots clean so that Ralsei doesn’t have to see him doing it. Once he turns back he’s lickety clean, which the prince gets to see.

“And now, finally, into the oven with the cake, little creature.”

No magic to cook the cake? Mrs. Toriel always does it for her pies. Perhaps it only works for pies then? What with the cake form having much larger walls maybe the heat needs to be more dispersed compared to just having fire underneath? With pies a nice, hearty crust is important, whereas with cakes it should still be a bit spongy.

“Something on your mind?” asks the prince to the deeply-pondering little creature with one mitten-covered hand on the oven handle. “Something you want to say before the cake goes into the oven?” He struggles a bit with holding the cake form in just one hand, so the soot lets the prince know with a shake of his head that the ovening can go ahead. “Could you set the timer there on the other table, little creature? 45 minutes, please.”

After an affirming salute, the soot hops down the workbench and saunters over to the table the prince pointed to. It’s a more casual table, as the soot would describe it. Not really a dining table or a work table, but more a table to just sit and enjoy company around. Something like that would’ve fitted very well besides the sofa next to the bookshelf.

But alas…

Unlike the flour-dusted workbench, the more casual table only has a book and a timer on it in the shape of the Deltarune. The soot turns the middle until the notches show 45 minutes, and the timer begins its rhythmic ticking. With that out of the way, the book on the table piques the soot’s interest. 

Man-you-all?

No, not really? Susie is a girl.

...She is one...right?

Right?

Oh, it’s manual.

Ah, that’s better.

Manual for what though, exactly? Can’t be for baking, because that’s called a recipe, so it must be for something else. 

But for what?

Well, only one way to find out!

“Little creature, what is it?”

Please read it for him, prince!

“What are you jumping and waving like that for?” Ralsei asks while removing his Deltarune-covered mittens onto the top of the oven. He stands up on his toes to look over the many ingredients between him and the soot. “Ah, my manual.” With a brisk couple of happy bounces, the prince hurries over with haste to the little creature taking interest in his book. “This book contains all you need to know to live in this world, little creature.”

Well now…

“You see,” Ralsei begins as he sits himself down in a chair while leafing over to the first couple of pages in his manual. The soot peeks around the dark, furry fingers to find some cute, but admittedly crude drawings depicting castles and what looks like large fountains. “There is a prophecy about three heroes that are destined to bring hopes and dreams to this world.”

Oh, so the soot outta find two more besides himself?

Read more, prince. Help the soot figure out which other two he needs to find!

With legs crossed and chin deep inside his palms, the soot sits down between Ralsei and the book.

“You want me to read more?” Ralsei titters to the steep lean forward the little creature does, brushing away the small, pink scarf from knotting itself around the small legs.

The little green hat almost flies off the bristled head shaking with all haste.

To skip over the more...horrifying parts of the legend, the prince collects some of the first few pages in his fingers before turning them quickly. “The legend tells of a human, a monster, and a prince from the dark, little creature.” Ralsei points to each of his drawings as he speaks, with the soot’s head following like it was connected by taut string. “These three heroes of legend are to bring balance to the light and dark that govern this world, and to sooth the fountain that stands in the kingdom’s middle.”

In the middle of Ralsei’s kingdom…

“The legend is only spoken of in shadowy whispers when no one else is looking. One small slip of the tongue and the legend might not come true.”

Oh no!

“It is a legend passed down from the ones that came before me, little creature. A legend that both brings fear and hope to us in this world. A legend that brings both light and dark.” Ralsei turns the page to one painted half and half. “Balance is what the legend speaks of. A balance that is destined to arrive from distant lands underneath the sign we call the ‘Delta Rune’.”

Oooh! The soot recognizes that symbol!

“This Delta Rune is that of both light and dark. If the heroes represent the hopes, then the Delta Rune represents the dreams. For dreams can both be pleasant,” as indicated by the drawing of Ralsei in a bed sleeping soundly with dreams of cake and happy smiles, “and scary,” as indicated by the drawing next to the prior depicting Ralsei sleeping unsoundly with jagged teeth and scary eyes hovering about him.

The soot wraps his scarf around his mouth and face at the scary drawings.

“S-Sorry, l-little creature!” The prince turns the page quickly to a drawing of a field with trees carrying the strange orange leaves in their crowns. “T-That’s why this is called the ‘Fields of Hopes and Dreams’, as it is both light and dark when it is in bloom. The bloom is the hopes for the plants, don’t you agree?”

Yes. Yes!

Read more, prince!

The soot scoots forwards closer to the pages, enough so that Ralsei can’t turn the page without also slapping the little creature. With one small hand touching one of the drawings, the soot can only imagine who these three powerful and legendary heroes could be. One blue, one pinkish-red, and another clad in green were on the pages before.

Who could those heroes be?

Ralsei scoots the book forwards a bit to turn the page and not hit the soot. “For these heroes I’ve written this manual so that once they do find their way here they will have an easy time fulfilling their prophecy.” He runs a finger over a drawn map that the soot recognizes to a slight degree. He can see where that field of weird orange-leaved trees is, as well at that one shop, but there are no indications of where the kitchen he and Ralsei are in is located.

There is a cake symbol on the map though. Could that be it? The soot reaches up to touch at it with one hand, and then extends his other to point over to the oven. He looks at Ralsei, eyes glittering with magic wonder. “Is that cake the same as the one in the oven? Is that what you want to ask me?” Ralsei asks to the soot who nods as an answer. “No, I’m afraid not. That is another cake.”

A much worse cake, no doubt. Probable a cake that uses buttercups rather than cups of butter or something else silly. Why the prince spent the effort to draw it has the soot confused. While he would never question his prince, apart from the times that he did, why Ralsei would mark the location of a lesser cake for the heroes doesn’t strike the soot as the most logical decision. Mayhaps that it could be because it is a dangerous cake that the heroes must be aware of? That would be an explanation.

Not the best explanation, but an explanation.

Wait!

Could it be…

That the cake Ralsei is baking is the cake of light and the one he’s warning about in his manual is the cake of dark? 

The soot’s eyes widens to fill out the entire area of his glasses, eyes quivering with shimmering admiration.

Prince…

Who else could be so dedicated to the legend than the prince? Who would go so far as to make sure that even cakes are balanced between light and dark? Only the prince, and no one else!

Only the soot’s prince!

The map drawn in the manual continues in th opposite direction of the dark cake towards colorful forests, squared walkways, and finally a great, big castle.

Great, big, and ominous castle.

It looks like a place a bad guy would live in.

Scary.

The next page features a bunch of stances and instructions for how to make friends. “You don’t really need to read this part, I feel, little creature. However, if you still want I can read some for you?” 

Please!

“First you need to approach with a friendly smile to whomever it is you’re trying to befriend. This is a very important step, as it will be your new friend’s first impression of you, which you want to make a good and innocent one.” Ralsei’s finger taps at the drawing showing him and another him meeting eyes. “Try and meet your new friend in a place where you both enjoy spending time in. This way you already have something in common to talk about!” The next step the dark finger moves towards is that of two Ralseis talking to the other with bubbles above their heads featuring ice cream. “Finding things in common is key to making friends, with the more the better!”

Yes, yes!

All excellent advice!

Not for the soot, of course, since he already knows it all by heart, naturally.

But for...others. For others it is excellent advice. For others that don’t have any friends. Not the soot though, he has many friends.

…

But he will still listen to the prince’s instructions despite...that.

The furry finger makes its way to the next page featuring the two Ralseis smiling and cheering with their arms in the air. “If you continue along with finding things in common eventually you will have a new friend. After that, you can do like all friends do.”

Like what, prince?

The soot looks up to Ralsei with wide eyes quivering with moisture.

What do friends do?

The soot...knows...what friends do. He has many...friends, but still. Please tell the soot what friends do, prince?

Please…

“You can do like all friends do, little creature, and bake cakes.”

Bake…cakes?

L-Like...like the one in the oven? The light cake? Is that what friends do? They bake cakes like that, prince?

“Friends bake cakes, don’t they, little creature?”

Yes!

Yes they do, prince Ralsei!

With a springy bounce, the soot jumps up onto the slightly-startled muzzle of the prince. He lays himself down on the soft fur to hug. To hug harder as he’s never hugged before. 

Thank you, prince Ralsei!

“Ow ow ow ow ow.”

Thank you for wanting to be a friend with the soot!

“Ow ow ow ow ow.”

The soot’s bristles are pushed deep into the dark muzzle with so much happiness and love that Ralsei can’t help but stand up and shake his wrists and hands limply. “L-Little c-creature!”

Yes, yes, the little creature is Ralsei’s friend too, and friends deserves the biggest hugs! In fact, the soot hugs even harder to show just how much he’s friends with Ralsei. Harder, yet harder.

“Aaah aah aah ah ah ah ah aaaaah. Little creature! Aaah ah aaaah.”

Ralsei truly is a wonderful prince. A wonderful, meeping, whimpering, and high-pitch-stuttering prince that the soot is so happy with calling a true friend. Even happier being called a true friend as well. Can’t you say it again, please, prince? Just one more time?

“Aah aah aaah ah aaaaha aaaah.”

Must be an ancient tongue passed down by the kings and queens that came before him only uttered in the presence of true friends.

Oh the soot is so blessed!

“Yoo! Guess what, Ralsei! Rouxl added more to his sign when he saw me and Kris walking up and-”

More friends?

“Oh that little bramble is getting it now!”

Yes, more friends!

“Gonna pluck you like those damn things that get stuck no your clothes and- AARRGGHH!”

The soot forgives you for your past transgressions, Susie. With a big and hard hug on your nose he lets bygones be bygones.

“He stings! He stings! He stings!”

Oh how wonderful of you to also let things be in the past, Susie. How grateful the soot is that you’re already making jokes in well-natured spirits as good friends do. For that you deserve an even bigger hug!

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!”

Susie’s violent thrashing has her arms and legs whizzing past Kris’s head, catching it in the rapid turbulence like a hurricane. The human keeps a neutral expression though, and just reaches over to the can of powdered sugar which is then handed over to Ralsei’s stunned hand not knowing at all what to do with the situation. “W-What? W-Why d-did you give this to me, K-Kris? Sus-sie is-” The prince’s stuttering is interrupted by an emotionless point to the opened manual thrown on the casual table. The drawn images depicts how to best make a glazing for a cake, with a major ingredient being powdered sugar. “I g-guess,” Ralsei says in return just before his hat gets knocked off by Susie’s left arm. That Kris isn’t reacting to the vulgar swearing and the tempered growling has Ralsei both feeling more and less secure at the same time. With Kris not reacting it’s clear that the situation isn’t dangerous, which has Ralsei more secure.

Less secure though is...well...

What will Susie do to the little creature?

“Gotcha!”

Well, she will plop him off her nose while fighting back tears and a snotty sob.

“You little-”

Then she will be displaying a very angry frown that doesn’t do good in hiding that her nose is hurting despite her thick skin. She will leer as angrily as her angry frown towards the smiling soot in her hand holding out his arms for another hug.

“You- Yaaargh! Just keep baking!”

And then finally with a throw she will send the soot flying through the air until he deploys his hat to slow his fall. Like a leaf meandering to the ground from a branch, the soot descents calmly and securely, landing on the manual with a soft bend of his knee.

No, wait, one more thing Susie will do, which is huffing even more angrily to then pick up Kris under her arm on her way out the kitchen door again. “T-The l-light fixt-tures!” Ralsei shouts as Susie’s hand squeezes the door handle.

“Oh for-” With simmering rage Susie closes the door gently, leaving behind indents of her fingers on the door handle. “Can’t even be angry properly here!”

Why would she be angry though? She has a new friend. A soot friend. Shouldn’t that make her the happiest she has ever been?

Right, prince?

“Hm?” Ralsei perks while flouring off his hat with a couple of cloud-creating pats. “What is it, little creature?” He looks down to the page the soot is standing on. “Oh, you want to help me with the glazing?”

The soot follows the prince’s eyes down. He didn’t really notice the drawings as he landed on them, depicting a drawn Ralsei presenting a bunch of ingredients collecting into a bowl. After readjusting his glasses, the soot nods to the prince.

He can help the prince, sure. There’s still some time left for the cake to be in the oven, so passing the time with doing something productive is a sound idea as any, prince.

So what would you have the soot do, prince?

“You can read out the ingredients for me, little creature?” Ralsei points to where they are written out in the manual which he then picks up. “I’ll go get the bowl and meet you at the work bench, okay?”

The soot salutes and jumps down the casual table with a nice glide using his hat. Climbing up the work bench is easy now since he’s done it before, so he’s up it in the matter of seconds. The ingredients that were written down for the glazing should all be on the work bench somewhere. The butter is near where the cake form was. The milk is a bit further away, and the vanilla extract was among the smaller containers that the soot was among when Ralsei put his hat down. The only ingredient that is missing is the...powdered sugar.

Which is on the casual table.

That the soot just jumped down from.

Bleh!

He gets a bit more of a running start off the work bench, with a springy bounce off the soft rubber lid of the jar of baking soda. With more height and more speed, the soot manages to glide all over the length of the distance between the work bench and the casual table.

However, as he reaches up the length of the leg of the casual table, he’s greeted by the furry arm of prince Ralsei, who grips the powdered sugar without thinking. “Oops,” he reacts as he spots that the soot was going for the powdered sugar. “Did you want to bring this over?” To make up for it, Ralsei offers the soot a ride inside the bowl. “Hop in.” The soot does so, and is carried over with a long swoop. “There we are.”

With a quick skip out the bowl, the soot wastes no time gathering the ingredients for Ralsei. The butter, the milk, the vanilla extract, and finally the powdered sugar which the prince brought over himself. Finally the measurements the soot fetches, the many plastic sizes clacking together like a rickety train as the soot hurries over with their joint ring in hands. He spreads out the measurements for the ingredients, with each size pointing towards their respective ingredient.

“I’m ready when you are, little creature.”

It’s…

It’s just adding the ingredients, prince.

No big deal.

“Oh...”

Just...yeah, add them and mix ‘em up. Quickly, if you would. The soot would like to go back to reading a bit if that’s all the same to you, prince. They kinda left off in the middle of it just as things were about to become exciting.

“S...Sure. If y-you want to read, then go ahead.” Ralsei motions for the manual. “You can keep an ear on the timer while you’re there, will you?”

The soot was already gliding by the time Ralsei made his motion. In fact it actually gave the soot a bit of a helpful gust as he swept his hand, enough for the soot to reach a leg of the casual table without even touching the floor. After a quick curry up it, the soot returns to the opened manual with an inquisitive hand rubbing his bristly chin. Following the page detailing the cake glazing there is a section about how to cook marmalade using different kinds of fruit. Then a section about about how to escape the jail of the different castle dungeons. Then a section about how to stuff a doll.

Ah, that last one might actually be quite useful later when it comes to the doll in Kris’ backpack.

Actually…

“Little creature?” Ralsei’s attention is brought to the manual by the soot waving after lifting up one half of the book and letting it fall to make an attention-grabbing sound. “What is it?” With his arms busy stirring the glaze, Ralsei leans down to where the soot is pointing. “About doll-making? Stuffing specifically?”

Yes, but please don’t say it out loud. It makes it weird that the soot is planning to stuff you, prince.

“Do...do you need some cotton? Is that what you want?” Ralsei’s surprise is mirrored by the soot being surprised that the prince understood what he wanted. “Eh...how much?”

How much? 

How much was it in the doll in Seam’s shop? Granted, it did make the prince look quite more rounded than what he really is, so a bit less than that would be nice.

“I should have that much...” The prince looks around with his thinking brow lowering with each turn of his head. “Somewhere.” Exactly where though he has to mutter to himself. “There? Or...maybe it was there after I sewed Kris’ mantle? Then there was the padding for Susie’s cuffs too, I suppose.” He puts down the bowl of half-stirred glazing to go and look, which the soot hops up upon and takes over while the prince looks. “Maybe I put it here? Do you need needle and thread too, little creature?”

Needle and thread too prince, thank you.

“You’re nodding, right?”

Yes.

“Y-You’re doing the s-same, so I guess that’s a yes?”

Not necessarily, but in this case it is. Luck works out some times.

As apparently it does with the prince since a happy “Aha!” has the soot slightly startled and forced to jump off the bowl lest he falls into the almost-stirred bowl of sticky glazing. Flour and powdered sugar the soot can easily get off of his bristles, but more sticky stuff is a bit of a nightmare.

A moderately-sized box is placed on the casual table with warnings written all over it about the sharp needles inside. Drawn faces of a talking Ralsei warns that they are no toys to be played with. Two plastic hatches open up with satisfying clacks to reveal a well-stocked assortment of sewing equipment inside. Sharp needles, various colors upon various thicknesses of thread, and finally cotton is what the soot sees that he would come to use. 

His hands clap together with satisfaction.

“This what you wanted, little creature?” wonders Ralsei with a happy expression since it’s really just a question for the soot rather than himself. The nod from the soot is obvious, but it has Ralsei nodding too, causing his ears to slip as happily off his shoulders. “For what though, exactly?”

Wait…

He doesn’t know?

Oh.

Oh!

Oh this is gonna be fun!

The soot bounces off the causal table in the direction of where Kris’ backpack lies slumped-over and flat bar some wrinkles in the fabric. Going inside it is a bit difficult as the soot has to both push up and forward to not get stuck in the backpack. He can see, which is a novel thing for him inside the backpack. Again though, he has some difficulties really getting into it. The cotton-deprived doll should be at the bottom of the backpack, and hopefully it hasn’t gone anywhere. 

Without any cotton it in, how could it?

“How...how are you faring, little creature?”

Should be around...here?

“You don’t need any help?”

Yes, here! Here’s the doll!

“I don’t want you to disappear in there.”

No, it’s fine, prince. You don’t have to get over here. The soot...can...not. The soot can not. He doesn’t have enough limbs to both lift the doll and the backpack at the same time.

How should he go about it though?

“I k-know that you kinda have to...well...disappear to get into this world, so disappearing from this world would have you ending up...somewhere.” 

One arm in.

“Actually, l-let me just help you, little creature.”

Then another.

“That way y-you can just focus on w-what you want to s-sew, right?”

Then his legs.

“Little creature?”

Then his head.

“Little-”

It is a bit difficult seeing through the deflated muzzle of the Ralsei doll, especially since Seam didn’t make any eye holes to actually see through. However, the soot knows a very awkward situation when he sees one, especially when he is one, and for that he doesn’t even have to see. All he needs is the stunned and confused groan from the prince that reminds the soot of the modem Kris uses to get onto the internet. 

“Little...creature?”

Not anymore, dear prince. There is no little creature anymore.

Only you!

Only Ralsei!

Twin princes for a kingdom threatened asunder! 

One of dark!

And one of…

Of…

Hm…

The doll puts its limp hand up to its deflated chin for a soft rub while the soot thinks before he speaks.

For once.

Is he willing to become this? To become a prince with the burdens placed upon royal shoulders? Even more so to fully commit to being a prince of light? Two princes of dark will upset the balance, won’t it? A prince of dark must have an equivalent prince of light.

Or…

If the current prince of dark abdicates his throne it’ll give the soot the chance to become the prince of dark. He’s already wearing Ralsei’s skin inside the doll, so how much further a step is to make sure that the current prince is...persuaded...to give away his throne to the soot? Shouldn’t be that far a step, really.

“Is t-that the d-doll Seam said he would m-make, little creature?” The prince’s voice is unsure and frankly a bit disturbed. “He didn’t get time to stuff it, I’m guessing?”

Yes and no.

“Is it...soft?” Ralsei asks again after a long silence. “Soft as in...comfortable? It looks c-comfortable.” He has some trouble saying that last word. “Y-you want t-to stuff it with c-cotton?” That too. “Is that what you want?”

There are a few things the soot wants at the moment. Some a bit more complicated than the other. However, the simplest and easiest thing he wants is to get out of Kris’ backpack. If the prince could help with that the soot will reconsider wearing the prince’s skin and take over his position on the throne.

With a pinch that doesn’t want to touch the doll at all, Ralsei lifts the doll up by its squished head out of the backpack with the soot still inside. At an arm’s length he carries the soot over to the casual table with the sewing equipment to place it down. As thanks, the soot stands up and bows deeply with the doll mimicking the motion.

The respectful gesture does more bad than good.

Before the soot can egress from the doll’s innards, Ralsei turns away to go back to finishing up the glazing and cleaning up the work bench of the remaining ingredients. With a drooping ploof the empty doll falls flat-muzzle-first down onto the casual table with its back opened and exposed as the soot steps out of it. With the harsh light of the fluorescent fixtures above its spread-out, deflated posture reminds the soot of the movies that Kris and Asriel would watch late at night on the computer inside their room after promising to go to sleep.

Why they stayed up past bedtime to watch sewing instructions the soot have no idea, but is grateful to as it comes in handy for him remembering them now that he has to stuff the doll with cotton.

…

Nope, even after having thought of it multiple times it still sounds weird.

More reason for the soot to get it over it, he supposes.

And supposing he does, especially with the amount of cotton he brings with his first large hug from the available cotton. It takes a few stomps and jumps to persuade the cotton to fill in the nooks of the doll. Of its fingers, toes, small fangs, horns, and ears. Not evenly, unfortunately. On the first go the doll looks a bit like Ralsei with a severe allergic reaction. The nose is bigger than the head and the ears are swollen until bursting. 

Nothing another round of a couple of hearty stomps and punches can fix though. Then some massaging so that the ears are properly fluffy. It is a process, yes, but it is a process that the soot does diligently. He has the live model nearby so really there’s no excuse for the doll not to look precisely correct. A bit more cotton to one arm, then to the other. Pinching away some from the fangs, or perhaps adding some to make them a bit cuter in their length?

And if the soot does that, should he try and beautify the rest of the doll too? It is of the prince, so it will be a damning challenge to perfect upon perfection. A challenge, but a futile one, perhaps? Not something worthy of putting time into? There’s no way for the doll to look like the soot so it won’t be beyond perfect, unfortunately.

So maybe good enough is good enough?

The soot sits the doll up against the closed manual before taking a few steps backwards to inspect his work. He massages the bristles on his chin as he takes in the weight of how the doll settles itself. It’s not lifelike just yet in the way it slumps down from the weight of the cotton inside it. There’s too much in the head still. What the soot could do is put more of it in the ears to balance the doll that way? Not enough to again have it look the doll is swollen, of course. 

Some over to the left.

Then some to the right.

And then-

Oh boy!

The doll’s stuffed muzzle is pushed together as it bounces against the casual table after sliding off the manual’s back. It again lies on its stomach, but with the cotton inside of it having shifted from its fall enough that it looks rounded enough to be life-like.

Guess it was third time’s the charm when it came to stomping on the doll?

How morbid.

But oh well, the soot is not gonna look a gift doll in the mouth. From the outside, that is. He’s already done it twice or thrice from the inside already. Now all that remains is sewing the back back up and it’ll be done.

The soot fetches a very dangerous and sharp needle from the sewing kit, as well as a thick, black thread. The needle is cumbersome, and if the soot trips or otherwise get startled he will be in a lot of danger.

But there wouldn’t be anything nearby that would possible startle him to that extent, would there?

Yes, actually.

The Delta Rune timer counting down its last seconds!

Which is why the soot puts down the needle and thread before covering his ears to brace for the loud ringing that signals that the cake is done.

Otherwise he might hurt himself.

“Ah!” reacts Ralsei with a joyous accent to his excited yelp that has his ears flop like the wings of an angel. “The cake is done, little creature.”

Yes, he noticed.

What with the timer going off just next to him.

Even with pushing his flats as hard as he could into his ears it still continues to ring as the soot wanders over to the doll with eyes vibrating inside his skull. It has the soot walking a bit funny, almost tripping himself over at times. Once at the doll the soot stops his vibrating eyes by pushing his temples together, stopping the ringing and giving him back the focus in his vision.

Don’t want to have an unsteady hand to sew with. 

That would be like putting on the glaze before the cake had cooled a bit.

Just silly.

“I’m gonna put on the glaze now, little creature.”

The soot is gonna ignore that. With one eye closed and tongue slightly out to help him focus, he instead shoves his arm through the needle’s eye while holding a thick piece of black thread. Precision is key to get the thread through, even if the soot could fit both his arms through comfortably. He ties up the thread and prepares his patient by lifting up some of the loose fabric at the back. The needle pierces without any hindrance, and the soot begins to stitch together to lock inside the cotton filling by crossing down the exposed back. 

Somewhere behind him the prince whistles happily, giving proof that the doll isn’t of the voodoo kind.

Above, below, above, below. Down the back the needle goes. Where it stops, only the soot knows. Just above where it would become indecent, that is. A few hard tugs is needed to sorta snip off the excess cotton trying to peek through the cross stitch, but after that the soot only has to tie together the black thread with itself and he’ll be done! He bites off the thread from the needle and tightens it one more time before joining it with where he started at the top of the doll’s back. 

Et voilà!

As they say in that arcane tongue spoken by the humans.

The doll is done! Stuffed and naked! Just as how it was meant to be!

After some convincing, the soot manages to have the doll sit pretty up against the manual. He tells it with a few tough, but fair, waggles of his finger that its job is to guard the manual while the soot and the prince finish garnishing the cake, alright?

The doll’s head slumps over in response.

Good enough as an acknowledging nod as far as the soot is concerned.

With the needle over his proud shoulder, the soot marches back to the sewing kit to stow back what he used. The needle among its metal brethren, and the rest of the thread spool with its multi-colored brethren. Then the soot closes the lid and locks it shut.

He thinks for a moment with his hands still on the second latch.

Then he opens up the sewing kit again and rummages carefully through the needles for the largest and thickest he can find. With that one picked out he again closes the sewing kit and marches over to the doll with the large needle mounted over his shoulder.

Atteeeeenchun’, doll!

The soot clicks his heels together before rigidly dismounting the needle from his shoulder. He brings it in front of him to then push it down into the table. He lifts it up again, spins it around two laps, then puts it down with more vigor and rigor. 

Your duty, doll, is to guard the sacred text from any and all intruders that might cause a threat towards his majesty Prince Ralsei!

With the pride and honor bestowed upon the soot by his majesty Prince Ralsei, he transfers the duty of guarding the sacred texts to the doll, along with the weapon of which to use to defend against those who seek to defile the holy words penned by the prince. It is an honor both to the soot to bestow upon the doll this duty, as it is an honor for the doll to receive this duty, and to guard not only with his life, but his soul as well.

The doll’s head slumps lower as the soot nestles the needle under its arm and ear, indicating a respectful bow. It has the soot’s eyes watering at the sight of someone else so dedicated to the cause and court of Prince Ralsei, and he salutes the doll with his chin high and his eyes wet.

Make the prince proud, doll!

Alone, but not in spirit, the doll sits guarding the manual with head bowed and weapon at the ready as the soot jumps off the edge of the casual table to glide over to where the prince is finishing up the last paint-like strokes of the glazing on the cake’s sponge.

“Ah, there you are,” says Ralsei as the soot climbs up onto the work bench next to the cake. “Forgive me for not offering you to help me with the glazing, but you have to put it on very quickly for it to drape nicely down the walls and be even at the top. Looks almost like a candle has melted over it, doesn’t it?”

Despite the way the prince formulated it the glazing still looks appetizing, funnily enough. Maybe the soot was wrong about glazing being applied on later? Or maybe it was just the prince’s magic to be able to put on a good glazing even when the cake is hot and steamy?

The latter case is the most probable to the soot, so that outta be it.

“How would you want to garnish it, by the way?” 

The soot’s eyes shoot over to Kris’ empty backpack.

“Maybe some fruits would be good?”

Y...Yeah…

Yeah fruits are good. Maybe some strawberries or something. No need for cake garnishing that’s too sugary and sweet. The glazing is enough sweetness and all that. No need for more.

No need to go back to Kris’ backpack and rummage through the few plastic wrappers left inside.

Just go with some fruits.

“Hey, Ralsei! Can I borrow your manual for a quick second to check some laws about property damage?”

Maybe a coconut even, speaking of nothing.

“It’s nothing bad really,” Susie explains with very poor conviction as she rolls her wrists and hands walking backwards through the kitchen towards where the manual sits. “Just a few things that will surely be fixed within...a couple of years ago. Theoretically, that is. Not like it’s something that any of us actually has to worry about.” With a plastered smile she tries to display her innocence reflecting off her uneven smile, but the florescent light has it looking a bit...not at all trustworthy. “Speaking of nothing, by the way, maybe we should have our little tea party in our world instead? The weather’s real nice today and I’m sure that Kris’ dad will let us borrow one of his colorful and flowery picnic blankets to use and- Ow!”

Oh nice, the doll did his duty in guarding the manual against invaders that look to claim its knowledge for nefarious needs.

“Why the hell is there a doll with a needle here!” comes a slightly-muffled swear from Susie sucking on her pricked finger. Her buffoonish and clumsy reaching even knocked the doll over.

You did good, doll.

You did good…

“Eating the cake in your world?” Ralsei looks to Kris quickly enough that his ears flopped against his cheeks. “Is that really a good idea for me to visit there again?” The claws on his index fingers tick together as he squirms awkwardly at the prospect. “Last time it was quite scary how quick your mom went from overwhelmingly happy to then confused enough that it broke her heart. I still remember how she called me by your brother’s name and lunged over to embrace me...”

The soot must’ve been busy that day because he sure doesn’t remember it. Maybe it was on one of those days where he was doing those very important things he’s always busy with. Those very, very important things that has him busy constantly. Just so incredibly busy.

Like taking long naps.

Very important indeed.

“Well it won’t happen again with Mrs. Toriel, Ralsei,” argues Susie with her pricked finger pushed against her lip. “And besides...” With widened eyes and a worried scowl Susie tip-toes over to the kitchen window where there can be seen a small gathering of torches and pitchforks. She closes the curtains featuring embroidered flowers in the same shape as the weird orange leaves. “I think we outta get going now before the...eh...cake gets cold.”

A sizable rock crashes through the window, shattering pieces of broken glass through the thin curtain fabric.

Actually the soot agrees with Susie for once.

In spirit, that is, and not really in the way she scoops him up while running with a ducked head away from the sizable rocks following the first one. Her hard hand scooping him up has him sounding like a squeezed dog’s toy which is very rude of Susie to do. Her other arms sweeps with it the manual and doll which she dumps into Kris’ backpack. “Right now is a good time, I feel.” As well as the soot.

What follows is a ride more bumpy than anything the soot has ever experienced. Even worse, it goes on and on and on and on, with yelps and worried whimpering rocking the backpack slung on Susie’s back with the soot flying around inside it with each rapid stop and even more rapid shift in direction. The soot holds on for dear life with a tight hug around the doll providing cushion against the dangerous knowledge of the manual bouncing around even more.

“The fountain is clear! Let’s go! Let’s go!”

A flash surges throughout the soot, with a strange feeling taking him over like thunder from a clear night sky.

Something feels...weird.

“We made it!”

Wait...not weird.

“Too close that time. Everyone in one piece?”

Yes, weird, but like...it shouldn’t be weird? Almost like remembering a habit that you forgot, kinda? It’s hard to describe, especially in the dark of Kris’ backpack worn by Susie.

“Y-yes, I am, S-Susie. Kris looks fine too.”

What could it be?

“The cake?”

It’s on the tip of the soot’s tongue!

“It’s fine.”

He can feel it!

“Alright, let’s head to the lake then. Less gloomy than the graveyard.”

“...B-But why w-would we picnic there?”

“Look, Ralsei, I’m still coming down from having been chased for like half an hour straight.”

Oh yeah, poor just you, Susie. No thought spared to the soot who’s had to worry about getting the manual clonked against his head for the same half hour!

With an angry huff that completely eradicates the strange feeling, the soot pulls down his hat over his eyes and nestles in comfortably in the doll’s embrace. He needs a nap after this, dangit. 

Mmm…

Soft and gentle doll of the prince, whisk the soot away to the land of naps.

Whisk...him…

Away…

“Oh wait!”

Aah!

“What about the soot?”

Who? What?

“Oh he’s in Kris’ backpack, Ralsei.”

Well, at least it was Ralsei’s voice that awoke the soot this time. His voice is much better to awake to. 

The soot rubs his eyes to help them wake up, but it’s rather moot as the sun shines straight through his glasses as the backpack’s zipper is opened. Complete white overwhelms the soot, who flinches away with his arms pushed up against the brightness. 

“Oh no, forgive me,” the prince’s gentle voice apologizes as he scoops up the soot much, much more gentler than Susie did. Still, even with the gentle pick up it is still very bright for the soot. “Were you asleep? Did I wake you up?”

You woke the soot up, yes, but you did it for cake, so your life will be spared.

“Good to hear.”

This brightness though. So damn white, everywhere.

Everywhere.

Everywhere…

“What is it, little creature?”

Oh no.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” the prince says with a slight chuckle that has his long ears shake and his fangs rest friendly over his lower lip. “Is it too bright for you outside?”

Oh no!

How!

B-b-b-b-b-b-b-but…

But the soot is black! He’s back to being black! Why… Why is the prince so white? And his robes! They’re pink!

No!

The soot’s robes are pink too!

No!

No this can’t be happening!

“I’m...I’m gonna let you shake off that stress you seem to be having, little creature.”

All of what the soot has done…

“Come over to us for some cake when you’re feeling up to it, alright?”

All of what he’s gone through to fix. To make black again from white, and green from pink.

“I’ll serve you up a piece.”

All of it…

“See you in a bit.

For nothing.

DAMMIT!

“What was that, Ralsei?”

“Hm? What was what?”

“That squeaking noise. It sounded like that closet door in need of some oil for its hinges.”

“Is there a noise? I can’t hear it.”

AND EVEN THE CAKE IS CHANGED FOR THE WORSE!

“There it is again. I’m not joking!”

FOR FU-


End file.
